#wow there are so many typos. pretend there are not <3

[zelda-posting]

tears of the kingdom could have been so good if it were built around like, its story or its characters instead of being a clunky shell to show off the mechanic no one asked for that it forces you to use

[ghost-of-a-slave]

hi , rq anon here from earlier !! ^_^

I'm kinda just gonna go on a ramble here about things you said in your response that were kinda like ... wow okay !! apologies for any improper grammer or typos too !! I'm a fast typer lmao

first , the fakeclaiming hello .... ???

"why is your support of minorities so conditioned" because a) I don't believe that the majority of you chucklefucks are actual minorities so this doesn't apply " wow okay !! that's certainly a way of thinking !! if your belief on someone's race , disability , gender , or trauma or literally anything only applys in certain situations , you are ALSO a bigot . your support for any minority shouldn't be conditioned the moment you disagree with them , or the moment they do something you don't like . you don't see me saying " ur not native american or a system or a trafficking victim bc ur an anti rq and i hate anti rqs !!! " like hello ???

" are you actually POC or are you "transrace" ? " if we're going in your definition , I'm " actually poc . " just like you , I'm native american ( just like you , yippie :3 ) , my dads entire side of the family is native . my grandma taught me how to make dreamcatchers and quillwork and beadwork and she told me many stories growing up !! my native features are pretty obvious too ( despite my skin ... super pale LMAO ) but so , yk , im bodily poc and have been since the day i was born .

" I have Because let's be clear so many radqueers are super fucking white and are larping as POC because they want brownie points or want to be allowed to say slurs. " idk what radqueers you're talking about but poc rqs make up a large handful of our community , at least from what ive been able to see and I've been active in the rq community for a long time . then with the larping as poc , again , the unnecessary and extremely rude fakeclaiming ?? claiming someone is faking their race ( or really faking ANYTHING ) without proof is extremely bad . for someone who claims to support minorities so bad , your view on ones that aren't like you sure is interesting !!

" If your fucking people were not genocided you will NEVER understand what it's like to be Native American and you doing shit like redface only makes things worse. " but i do understand and have understood since i was a little girl . assuming im lying about my race when i literally told you im bodily poc is so fucking weird and literally feeds into bigot behaviors !!

" are you actually traumatized or are you "trans trauma" and had a perfect life and never got hurt? " i was trafficked , raped , beaten and abused my whole life . my genitalia is deformed from how much sexual abuse I went through , I've been in therapy for years now . I'm willing to go into so much detail if you actually wanna know , but then again , you probably won't believe me bc your belief on victims stories is limited 🤷 I actively am in a toxic situation , infact , and just escaped an extremely toxic relationship with my ex , but sure , because I'm radqueer , suddenly I'm lying and just wanna pretend to be ruined for the rest of my life because it's cool .

" yet your community encourages people to not only pretend to experience what I did (trafficking) but also encourages purposefully endangering yourself and trying to GET PEOPLE ABUSED. " for starters , once again , have never seen anyone pretend to be trafficked in the rq community , but I might just be looking at the wrong side ! and then with trying to get people abused and stuff , the only thing I can think of to what you would be referring to is consensual relationships with cnc where one is transharmful and one is harmed . the thing is , notice how I said consensual ?? those sort of relationships are wanted and done safely , at least from what I've heard from people in those those sort of relationships .

" On the flip side are you someone who actually experienced something as extreme as I did or the same situation or are you "trans severity" " already stated this but i experienced just as much as you did ( well , in relations to trafficking at least , I'm not sure what your trauma is beyond that so maybe I have it worse or less worse than you , who knows )

" you have refused to do any of the work that is necessary to get over your own insecurities and accept that you can come away with the same kind of horrific fucked up mental state as people who go through a variety of things and by speaking over real survivors of specific areas not only are you doing self-harm (emotional) but you are ruining the chances of real survivors getting help and aid. " in therapy and am on meds for starters , so I'm not denying any work there . as for speaking over real survivors , nobody is doing that . at least not transramcoa people ( from what I've seen ) , most of them are aware of at least the basics of what it is we've gone through and they support us , maybe you've had a bad run but all my transramcoa friends love me and are always willing to listen to my stories about the things I went through . nobody is talking over you , nobody is saying you didn't go through the things you went through . as for ruining chances of real survivors getting help , ... how ??? genuinely how ?? if you're talking about transid people using things like mobility aids and stuff , then I don't necessarily understand how it's harmful . because one , a lot of transabled people don't really use mobility aids due to lack of money , unstable environments and stuff like that , but even those who do help normalize people using things like canes and stuff out in public , and if more people use mobility aids then a lot more companies will make them and stuff ( obviously , it'll kinda suck because inflation is wack )

" Are you actually disabled or are you "transabled" ? " once again , as already stated , I am actually disabled . I am diagnosed with MDD , GAD & ADHD and have been since I was a pre-teen , then I fit into all diagnostic criteria for bpd and autism and have suspected DID .

" The majority of radqueers however are not actually disabled or at least have a series of disabilities they pretend to have to make fun of people with those disabilities or because they think it's funny/cool. " no ?? again , I really & truly do not understand where you're finding these radqueers because all radqueers I've met have some sort of disability , either mentally or physically . and even then , I've never met a transabled person who does it to mock disabled people OR because they think the disabilities are cool . most transabled people I've met are transabled due to atypical dysphoria , presenting differently in headspace , source / kin memories , and most times they're transseverity ( aka , already disabled !! )

" and sure if I was you I'd be miserable because I was a bigot and bigots are miserable. But you could just no longer be like that if you stopped being a bad person maybe. " no , you'd be miserable because of all the things I deal with daily . you'd be miserable because I'm gonna have to repeat ninth grade most likely . you'd be miserable because nobody ever understands what I've gone through . you'd be miserable because I've been the " weird kid who doesn't understand social cues and is too loud " my entire life . you'd be miserable because I live with a mother who's like a ticking time bomb sometimes . I am not a bad person either , infact , I get told often I am a good person who's funny , kind , compassionate and very empathetic by my friends and family ( and yes , this includes the ones who know about my radqueer identity . yes , this includes even my ANTI friends who know I'm radqueer . ) , I am a much better person than I was when I was younger , my improvement in my behavior is something I'm extremely proud of actually !!

tl ; dr ;; your support and belief for minorities shouldn't be limited the moment you disagree with them . just because someone is different than you doesn't mean they're lying .

Okay, this may be the last one from you that I'm addressing not because I wish to drop the topic but because I now know I'm talking to a minor on an account I sometimes post sexually explicit posts on and I don't want to anytime soon unnecessarily expose you or other children to that as well as my own personal feelings about how I approach topics with those substantially younger than myself. I want to start off by and be clear that this is not to say children are lesser or dumb but rather that I know from my own experiences that it's a lot harder to be at a better place mentally the younger you are and the closer to trauma you are. The way I reacted and the way I have spoken to you is incredibly unnecessary and I apologize for any distress I may have caused. I do not wish to cause harm to children whatsoever. I also know that when it comes to groups I personally see as a genuine danger to my safety I will be incredibly aggressive and harsh. This harshness is meant primarily for adult radqueers who have the ability to know better, fully understand right from wrong, and specifically the ones who do everything in their power to berate genuine minorities. I am so genuinely sorry that you've been sucked into that hell and you are not to blame nor deserving of any of this. I've been there, I'm pretty sure I got trafficked in highschool still as well. I know how horrific it is. And I'm also very sorry that I did not think about properly wording my previous post as talking in generalizations without clarification obviously would end with me fakeclaiming you which was wrong of me on many levels. The anger I hold to the people being genuinely bigotted and cruel should not be placed on people who genuinely seem to not hold those fascistic and horrific ideas.

I don't believe it's bigoted for me to often doubt the validity of someone's claims if they're a part of a social movement built on the basis of lies, manipulation, and other falseities. Transids/TransX is based on lying to other people and taking up space in communities of minorities while knowing you are not that minority. For example a fully white person claiming to be "trans native" going to events for natives or even lying for scholarships and similar yet not even knowing the name of whatever tribe they're claiming to be a part of, anything about the history, or even trying to genuinely care about the people within that demographic. That person is a colonizer, I would hope you agree that colonization is bad. Which leads me to be confused as to why you would support a colonialist ideology such as transids/TransX. It doesn't matter if SOME people are not doing redface/blackface/similar, the overall concept is built specifically to defend those things. The most prominent example of transX identities is Oli London who was an obsessive stalker of a BTS member. He later claimed to "detransition" and is now an alt-righter spokes person online advocating for the brutality and legal oppression against trans people because of comparing real transgender people to his creepy racist bullshit he purposefully did to himself. This is what TransID is, and has always been. It is white people making a mockery of POC, and ableds mocking disableds by doing stereotypical impressions of mentally and physically disabled people to claim they're basically the same. Saying you are "transOCD" is faking OCD and is inherently making fun of people with OCD as well because it is making a mockery of what the actual disorder is. And faking a disorder for attention is something you should not be encouraging as it's a sign of differing mental illnesses that when constantly played off as just a special little identity forces you to never look into getting care or aid. (And no TransID is nothing like being transgender. Gender is an immutable self concept, that self concept fits into societal ideas and is called gender. The self concept is not by any means attached to one's body it is core to the self. All things that fall under transIDs are actually just about your body and things that are not always inherent to the self. If one had a differing body or brain they would not have X experience. I'd also go as far as to say that I believe personality disorders are parts of the self- but if you don't have one that means your self is not supposed to have it and you are going against the nature of the self by pretending to have it and is still obviously vastly different from gender.)

The reason I doubt the claims of people who are radqueers on their own traits and identity is not out of hate for them- I do not doubt radqs because I dislike them- I doubt them because the community is centered on lying. It is an ideology that is rotted at the very core. There is no radqueer without lying about your identity. You cannot be a radqueer and be anti-racist because being anti-racist requires going against trace people. Because trace people only exist due to racism. POC people who feel they have to be white are struggling with internalized racism- telling them they're right and would be better as a fully white person is you being racist. White people larping as POC is obviously racist because they are physically not POC and will NEVER experience what POC do.

I am sorry that you don't see what this community you are in is built upon. I am sorry people are lying to you and pretending to care about your trauma. I really and truly do hope you can get away from these ghoulish people who are using you as a token minority and a shield. You do not deserve to have people telling you they want your trauma or calling you lucky for experiencing such horrific things.

Radqueers do encourage abuse. I was once sent a massive thing screaming at me by another radqueer for daring to get free of trafficking and told I only existed to be raped and that's all I deserved and I was a bigot for taking away from biastiophiles because the radq community is filled with abusers who are pro-contact for horrific things. I am referring to the people in the community who go and do shit like that. The people who have been outed for sexually abusing children, animals, and corpses. The people who have tried to push people with disordered masochism such as myself into getting severely injured to the point of hospitalizations. I am talking about the people who encourage and advocate for the legalization of child abuse. I am so fucking glad you haven't run into those people, I am very fucking genuine when I say that I am terrified for people your age who are in that community. I am terrified that radqueers will get more people abused and killed. I don't want more people to die or be abused that is why I'm anti radqueer.

People ruining chances for survivors getting help is a mixed bag as well. As a person in treatment for my trauma it's so fucking hard to get anyone who believes you, I lucked out on a therapist who'd worked with trafficking survivors before but due to the large proliferation of misinformation people genuinely do not know what happens in trafficking. I have been brutalized and attacked for being a survivor on the basis it sounded too far fetched. I have seen people get pushed away by law enforcement because too many liars have made false reports or similar. The massive situation with the satanic panic for example got therapists and survivors alike killed. This is just a continuation of that brutality. Anyone who is transRAMCOA is someone lying about being a survivor and causing severe harm and damage to real survivors. I'm sorry the people around you don't see you as someone who matters and sees your trauma as a joke. You don't deserve that. Nobody around you should be telling you how jealous they are to be brutalized like you are/were. They're not good friends and they're using you.

Disabilities are also not fun. Nobody who is "transabled" by radqueer terms actually cares about the people with the real disability because if they did they wouldn't be faking it. They wouldn't be making fun of the symptoms.

You seem to be struggling a lot with self hatred. And I can only help you pull through. Seeing such young people get sucked into abusive and cruel extremist groups is incredibly sad and I know nothing I say will ever save anyone but fuck me if I didn't want to at least try.

[zuppizup]

For fanfic asks:

3. I love Rayla in all of your fics😆. You capture many aspects of her character so well: funny, intelligent, resilient, but also broken.

8. Angst. You are so good at writing angst. Pure angst is usually too bitter, but you artfully mix angst with softness and tenderness, and create a kind of lingering taste (heat-wrenching feel) after people read it. To me, the ‘pretend’ part in Someone Like You has exactly this kind of taste.

12. I re-read Chpater1&2 of Someone Like You before following the regular updates to refresh my memory. I can’t believe you already noticed Callum’s temper at that time😆. Or did you updated theses two chapters?

3. The best character you’ve written for

Wow, thank you! I find Rayla more difficult to write than Callum essentially for the reasons you listed. There's a duality to her that takes a lot for me to consider while I'm writing her, both from an outside perspective and internal perspective. It's something I definitely spend a lot of time wondering if I'm getting right. I'm really happy to hear you like how I write her. 😊

8. What I like the most about your writing

Well, I do like angst... 😅 I very much agree with your preferences for angst. 100%, non-stop angst does feel relentless to me, so I definitely try and ensure there are lighter moments here and there.

12. A fic of yours that i’ve re-read

Oh I've been team "flip a table Callum" for a long time. I think I've written his temper in almost all of my long fics because it's such an essential part of his character in my view. I love how soft and supportive he can be, while having this bitter side lurking under the surface. I think it makes him a more interesting and dynamic character.

So nope, that's the same Callum from the original posting. I edited some typos before I started posting the new chapters but Callum’s temper was an essential part of the set up to that fic and was absolutely necessary to what came after in my mind.

Fanfic asks

[weebtarurights]

Sakuya Sakuma SSR (Exciting Move-in Day)

Read full translation under the cut! 

Story Title: “ The Shot of Nostalgic 5 ~ Spring Troupe~ “

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚ PART 1˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆

Itaru: "Out of the shadow from the field of the grave this summer...." [1] Masumi: I don't understand what that means. Tsuzuru: It's a typo as usual. I mean, the other parts are still Japanese, right? Izumi: I'm back-- Masumi: Director, welcome back. Citron: Ohh! Masumi is so fast. Like a thunder speed. Tsuzuru: It's lightning speed. Izumi:: Umm... What's everyone looking at? Chikage: It's the troupe's blog before the renewal. Izumi: Before renewal? Sakuya: Yes! I was supposed to write a blog post this time too but I can't think of anything to write. Then, I remembered the old blog. Itaru: The blog itself is renewed but the old blog is still around so everyone decided to take a look. Look, here. Izumi: Wow, how nostalgic! Itaru-san originally set up the blog to promote RomiJuli, right?   Itaru: That's right. There was a company homepage made by the manager before we launched the blog but the quality was so terrible. Tsuzuru: Ah, those flashing letters and rainbow logos... Citron: It was cracking all over! Tsuzuru:  You mean, flickering. Masumi: It was so lame. Chikage: Was it that bad? Citron: The data is still around. We can check it. This one. Chikage: I see. The anachronism is impressive. Was it made 20 years ago? Itaru: Exactly. Though if you look at it now, I didn’t notice how retro it was before? On the other hand, it might have the potential to go viral… Masumi: Not likely to happen. Tsuzuru: When you compare it to the new site, the difference between before and after is too extreme. Izumi: It’s also a part of Mankai Company's site history. Itaru: Because the company’s site was like that, I created the troupe blog to serve as a little publicity. Chikage:  You certainly can't grow page views with that site. Sakuya: Speaking of, the five of us took a photo and posted it on a blog, didn’t we? Izumi: Oh, there's that too. Tsuzuru. Indeed. Citron: I remember it too! Since we're already here, why don't we talk back the blog? Masumi: Not talk back, it’s backtrack. Sakuya: Ah, here it is! Chikage: The title is... "Spring Troupe Flagship Performance, During Practice". Citron: Here’s the photo of the five of us~ Itaru: Looking at it now, that's certainly it. Masumi: It is. Tsuzuru: It surely is. Sakuya: How should I put it? I can feel the awkwardness in the photo.. Citron: Our expressions are quite stiff. Chikage: Haha, you're right. Tsuzuru: We took this photo just for the purpose of posting it on the blog. Masumi:  It looks terrible because of a certain someone's fault. Itaru: Because of someone? Chikage: You mean Chigasaki? Izumi: Ahaha..... Itaru: There was a reason for that, you know.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚ PART 2˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆

Itaru: Hmm... I already launched the blog but the  PV isn't increasing at all.

Sakuya: PV is the number of page visitors, right? Tsuzuru: We released this blog for promotion but it’s meaningless no one’s batting an eye on it. Citron: Since we worked hard to make it, I want everyone to see it. Masumi: But how can we make them look at it? Izumi: Hmm… Increasing the number of visitors for the site and blog... Itaru: I know! Let's take a photo. Manager: A photo? Itaru: Yes, I have a charming face and Masumi is kinda good looking too. Masumi: I don't want to hear that from you. Sakuya: Citron-san is good looking too! Citron: Sakuya is cute! Tsuzuru: .... Manager:  No one is mentioning Minagi-kun. Tsuzuru: No, you don’t have to. Masumi: He's plain. Citron: Tsuzuru is easy to get along with~! Itaru: Exactly. Tsuzuru: Don’t force it. Manager: Spring Troupe does have high beauty rate~  You know, there's this one beautiful person in the first generation too. Itaru: You mean, Yuzo-san? Manager: Yuzo-san is still the same as before. Though he was popular for being wild. Izumi : (I wonder what Yuzo-san was like when he was still part of the former Spring Troupe. I’m a little curious.) Anyways, let's take a photo and post it on the blog. Itaru: Strategy for increasing PV: Winning women's hearts by  showing  off the appeal of hardworking boys ! --- Chikage: So you took this photo with ulterior motives? Itaru: That time, we had no choice but to grasp at straws. Tsuzuru: And that was just the start of all the troubles. --- Masumi:  We're taking photos in this place? Tsuzuru: Well, we're just taking photos so this should be fine. Manager: Let's start taking photos now. I will be your cameraman--- Itaru: Director-san, can you do it? I don't trust the manager's camera skills. Manager: Eh?! Don't say that. Citron: The images from the company site are all blurry! Manager: Eh~? Is that so? I uploaded the photos I took often and put them on the site. Izumi: Then, let me take it. Itaru: The position will be... Our leader, Sakuya , should be in the middle. Citron will be here, Masumi is here. Then Tsuzuru, move here. Sakuya: Yes! Tsuzuru: Here, right? Masumi: ... Tsuzuru: Don't just go close to the director on your own!  Move over here. Citron: My spot is here! Izumi: I'll take it  now. Say cheese~!        ---*click Izumi: What do you think of this shot? Itaru: Hmm, it's a bit too bright. Izumi: Got it! I'll take another one.    ---*click Itaru: Ah, this shot is as stiff as cardboard. Delete it. Izumi: Y-yes! One more time!    ---*click 

 Itaru: Maybe it should be a little more like this? The next one-- Masumi: Annoying. Tsuzuru: Aren’t you being too nitpicky? Itaru: Hmm. We've tried various things but for some reason, none of them is satisfying. Izumi: It's difficult. Itaru: I got it. There's a sense of distance. Sakuya: Sense of distance? Itaru: There's a sense of distance between us so let's move closer together. Masumi, come over here. Masumi: How troublesome. Itaru: Just do it. Citron, move here. Citron: Okay ! Me and Sakuya, shoulder to shoulder. Itaru: Yes, Like that. Let's take another photo.     ---*click Izumi: Well, that's the photo I took at that time. Tsuzuru: As a result, the photo looked a little awkward. Masumi: Itaru was really annoying. Itaru: The most important thing is that it was well received and we got good comments. Sakuya: The number of page views went up too, right? Citron: Yes! It was a great success! Chikage:  However, it seems like the group photos haven't been updated since then. Itaru: Well, that's all of it. Chikage: I guess so.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚ PART 3˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆

Tsuzuru: This kind of talk makes me feel nostalgic.

Citron: It's one of my many memories! Izumi: Yeah, I remember lots of things that happened during those days.

Choice 1: “We used to know very little about each other” Izumi: When we all first joined the company, we only knew a little bit about each other. Sakuya: That's right. Tsuzuru: I was surprised when I found out that Itaru-san is a game-addict. Chikage: I didn't know anything about everyone at first. Masumi: He was pretending to be an eloquent salaryman at first. Itaru: Ah, how nostalgic. Tsuzuru: No, I don’t want to hear that from you. Citron: But now, we know a lot of things about everyone like Sakuya's favorite food, and music that Masumi loves!

Choice 2: “There were fewer people” Izumi: There were fewer people back then. Tsuzuru: You're right. Looking  back, there were only the 5 members of Spring Troupe, the director, manager, and Kamekichi. Sakuya: When I think about it now, it feels strange. Chikage:  I was not around yet at that time so it's hard to imagine. Masumi: There were no other people around when I was walking down the corridors. I couldn’t hear other people's voices either. Citron: But now, the number of people has increased and it has become very lively! When Chikage joined Spring Troupe, the sparkles powered up!

Sakuya: That's right! We haven't taken any new photos, right? I mean, the 6 of us. Citron: Ohh! That's great! Tsuzuru: Yeah, That's a good idea. Itaru: Spring Troupe's revenge photo? Masumi: I want to take another photo with you. Izumi: No, no, not my photo. We're talking about Spring Troupe's photo. Chikage: But we already have plenty of good photos with the six of us in it. Why would we take photos again?   Sakuya:  I thought that I wanted to take a more natural photo of us. That's why, I wanted to take advantage of this situation and take a photo right now. Of course, I won't post it on the blog. Chikage: Well, if you put it that way. At least we're not wearing school uniforms this time. Itaru: Retrieving Sakuya's birthday memories. Citron: Everyone wore school uniforms! It was fun! Izumi: Leave it up to the camera man. Let's move to the theater. Tsuzuru: Roger! Izumi: I'll leave the positions to Itaru-san this time. Itaru: 'Kay. Then, senpai should be in the middle-- Chikage: Why me? Itaru: You know, gathering around grandpa. Chikage: The hell. I think our leader, Sakuya, should be in the middle. Itaru: That's fine too. Sakuya, stand between Masumi and Citron..... Is it okay now? Izumi: Well then, I'll take it quickly. Sakuya: We're counting on you! Izumi: (Looking through the viewfinder, there are the 6 members of Spring Troupe.) (It's different from that time. They're snuggling up more naturally. Their expressions are softer too.) (It’s giving off a warm atmosphere, almost like a family photo.) Izumi: Hehe... Citron: Director, why are you laughing? Masumi: You are so cute as you smile like that while holding that camera. Izumi: No, it's nothing.

Say cheese! 

NOTES:

1) The term used is  "今夏い野講袁墓の幽冥ナブたい出...”. I’m not sure where they referenced this title. The kanji is all mixed up and I couldn’t get any context from it at all >////<

[blurglesmurfklaine]

Cornelia Street (4/?)

A/N: oh my god they were quarantined

yes. It’s one of those fics.

AU, obvs

I’m posting as I go and idk how many parts this is going to be, likely won’t be very long but I literally don’t know what I’m doing and should i be starting yet another WIP? definitely not but fuck it lets fucking go

Title is from T-swizzles Lover album, I’m OBSESSED

Summary: Three years ago, Kurt and Blaine went on a disaster of a date and never quite got off on the right foot. Now, just before they graduate from NYADA, there’s a national outbreak and they’re both self-quarantined in a mutual friend’s apartment.

Read On AO3

On Tumblr: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Part 4

New Message: To: Sam I Am So… Funny thing happened Brace yourself I don’t think I hate Kurt Hummel anymore

New Message: From: Sam I Am THE TIME MACHINE WORKED! I AM A MEET-CUTE MASTERMIND!!!

Okay, this conversation is over. I regret bringing it up, BYE

No! Blainers, please don’t go!  You have to tell me EVERYTHING!!

Like what?

Like when’s the wedding? I’m kidding. Mostly. Like what happened?

I dunno… we were just. Hanging out, talking. Watching movies, playing battleship He’s not the villain I made him out to be, I think  He’s just a person

Oh?

A really cute and funny person… 

OH!? You totally like him now, don’t you? Wow, all it took was a global pandemic?

Shut up. I’m not even going to get my hopes up Fool me once

I’m not going to sit here and pretend to know what that saying means (you know how I get with idioms or whatever) and honestly shame on you for even assuming I’d know 

It means that Kurt doesn’t like me

You don’t know that

Let’s call it an educated guess based on past experiences. And you don’t know that he *does* so

Bitch Do you know who my girlfriend is? That’s nothing a little snooping can’t fix

Sam… Sam, whatever you’re thinking of doing, DONT 

Good news, I don’t think. I ACT!

SAM EVANS

God, this is SO much more entertaining than anything on Netflix right now

*

New Message: From: Mercedes 💞 How have you and Blaine been getting along?

New Message: To: Mercedes 💞 Well we HAD been avoiding each other for a few days

But..?

But that’s a little hard to do in close quarters … We actually had a good time tonight He’s a sweetheart, really

Oh, wow.

What?

Nothing… just never thought I’d hear you say that about Blaine

Why do you continually insist that I’m this stubborn headed fool?

Oh baby boy you so do not want me to answer that Drunk Jenga The ENTIRETY of sophomore year That time you insisted arugula was a classical instrument I could do this for hours

… okay you’ve made your point I’ve suppose I’ve just had a change of heart

Go on

I guess I always painted him as an asshole in my mind for ditching me And…

And???

Like I said, he’s hot SWEET! I meant sweet Typo!!

Boy, do not even act like those two words make even remotely the same shape on the keyboard But the guy’s cute, I’ll give you that So… do you like him?

I mean, I definitely don’t dislike him…

You, Kurt Hummel, are an expert at deflection

Did you change your Facebook profile pic?

BOI

Fine.  I think I maybe possibly might like him a teeny tiny bit But something tells me it’s one sided, since ya know He peaced out halfway through out first date

Something tells me the odds are in your favor

Okay cryptic Effie Btw, hope you’re staying safe 

You too, love

I’m calling it a night, love you

Love you, too Have fun in the arena, Kurtniss!

*

New Message: To: Mercedes (LOML) So!!!!??? How’d it go??

New Message: From: Mercedes (LOML) I don’t know how you managed to rope me into this stupid plan of yours, Sam But I think it worked

YES!!!!  I told you! I have an eye for these things Like when I said you and I would end up together And look at us now

Okay will you stop texting me?

Wow. Ghosted by my own girlfriend. Smh

We’re right next to each other!!! And you won’t respond to me verbally!

It’s about documenting this story

Oh my god You’re ridiculous  I love you

Love you too! <333

Part 5

[jwywrld]

voicemail

genre: fluff & slight angst

pairing: jung wooyoung (ateez) x fem reader

word count: 1900+ words

warnings: mention of loss of loved ones

summary: you don’t like phone calls but your history partner, wooyoung, insists on calling you for your project. frankly, he just wants to hear your voice.

-

a/n: hii i’m rly new to writing and this is my first post :) i’m rly nervous shdjs hope you like it! if i made any typos or errors i’m so sorry (also the title sucks im so sorry i really didn’t know what to name it)

-

ring! ring!

with a roll of your eyes, you pick up your phone. “ugh who is it. don’t they know i hate phone calls?” looking at the caller id, you saw that it was your history partner, wooyoung.

“hey! i heard we’re paired together for the history project!” a black haired boy chirped, bouncing up to you. “yeah.” you replied with a sigh. it was wooyoung, the nicest and most cheerful boy in your class. he seemed nice but you thought it was all an act. how could anyone be so nice to everyone all the time? it’s probably just to gain popularity. he was kinda cute though you had to admit. “great! just give me your number so we can work on it together.” he smiled, handing you his phone. after you keyed in your phone number, you turned and left, asking him to text you when he wanted to work on the project.

feeling your phone vibrate in your hand, you looked at it, seeing it was a text from an unknown number.

Unknown Number: hi! is this y/n?

y/n: who are you?

Unknown Number: it’s wooyoung, your history partner

y/n: oh

ok

wooyoung my history partner: can we start on the history project now? i wanna start on it earlier so we don’t have to rush it

y/n: can we start tomorrow

kinda tired now

wooyoung my history partner: sure! :)

“hello?”

“hi y/n!”

“why did you call me?”

“um.. because we have to work on the project?”

“wow didn’t know that. i meant why did you have to call me. can’t we just text?”

“calling is waaaayyy easier though!”

“i don’t like phone calls.”

“wha—”

you hung up.

about 3 seconds later, you got a text from wooyoung.

wooyoung my history partner: HEY!! why’d u do that! >:0

y/n: i told you. i don’t like phone calls. can’t we discuss over text?

wooyoung my history partner: No.

y/n: ugh

fine.

wooyoung my history partner: :D

immediately after, you heard your phone ring again. you sighed and picked it up.

“so... we have to choose between the mexican-american war or the cold war right?” you asked.

the two of you talked about the project for about an hour, researching and sharing the information you had found with each other, then collating it. in between, you guys made small talk and he told you a few jokes, causing you to let out small chuckles.

“ok that’s it for today. i still have work to do.” you said, your brain not being able to take any more history.

“ok bye—”

that wasn’t that bad! maybe phone calls weren’t as bad as you thought they were.

-

about 3 days later, you were practising some math questions. however, no matter how many times you tried it, you just couldn’t understand it. you decided to move on to the next question, only to find out that you were stuck as wel. frustrated, you felt the wet hot tears build up in your eyes. why do i have to be so dumb? why can’t i understand it right away? to make it worse, your exams were in two weeks and you had so much to catch up on. sitting at your table, you sobbed, the tears streaming down your cheeks uncontrollably.

feeling your phone vibrate furiously on the table, you saw that wooyoung was calling you. you declined it, wiping the tears away from your face.

wooyoung my history partner: why did you decline my call :((

y/n: do we really have to call???

wooyoung my history partner: i don’t understand! why do you hate calling people so much?

“y/n, your dad and i are going to be staying in New Zealand for a while to take care of gramps. i know you’re only 16 and it’ll be hard to be living alone but we’ll try to be back as soon as possible. we promise.”

“mom... why do i have to be left alone here?”

“sweetie.. we don’t have a choice.. gramps is really sick and needs someone to take care of him. i promise we’ll be back as soon as we can.”

those were the last words you had heard from your parents before they had gotten into a serious car accident right afteryour grandpa had passed. you had prayed for them to be okay for days, but to no avail. they had passed, leaving you, a 16 year old girl to fend for herself. after that incident, phone calls only reminded you of the day when the nurse had called you, informing you that your parents didn’t make it. it was one of the hardest years of your life, having to cope with the loss of your parents, grandpa and also having to get used to being alone. it had been 2 years and your aunt had been paying for the bills, insisting that you only repay her in the future when you had a stable job and income.

y/n: idk

wooyoung my history partner: wtv i’m still calling you idc

accepting defeat, you picked up the call, trying to calm your shaky voice.

“hi.” you said softly, your voice quivering.

“y/n? are you okay?” the concern in his voice genuine.

how did he pick that up from one word???

“yeah i’m fine. let’s just do this.” you sniffed.

“i’m not stupid y/n. but if you don’t wanna talk about it that’s okay.”

“thank you.” you croaked.

you let him do most of the talking while you typed down the points. after the discussion, you completely broke down again. not only because of stress but also because wooyoung’s question had reminded you of your parents.

“mom... dad... why did you have to go... i miss you so much. when can ever be happy again?”

-

after a week of calling wooyoung on the phone and discussing, you realised that you actually enjoyed talking to him. you also learned some things about him like how he was afraid of bugs and loved puppies. you also heard him talk about his younger brother and how much he missed him while he was staying at the dorms in school.

wooyoung my history partner: helloooo do you wanna meet tmr after school at the library to do the board

y/n: ok

wooyoung my history partner: can you bring the board & markers? i’ll bring paper & glue.

y/n: ok

wooyoung my history partner: ugh you’re such a dry texter

y/n: what did you expect me to reply to that???

wooyoung my history partner: ...

idk

y/n: exactly.

wooyoung my history partner: ok wtv see you tomorrow!!! :))

y/n: c u 2

why did you feel so nervous at the thought of meeting him tomorrow?

-

“hey woo” it was a nickname you had given him in the past week, thinking it was short and cute.

“hey y/n! did you bring the stuff?”

“yup”

“ok great”

you worked side by side, writing down the different notes and points, blushing when your hands accidentally brushed and mumbling a small ‘sorry’.

after two hours, your board was finally done!

“all that’s left to do is present”

“ugh that’s the WORST part”

“come onn y/n you know it’s graded! so let’s just do it properly”

-

a day later, before you called to practise your presentation. a thougut you had been pushing back popped into your head.

what happens to us after this project? i still want to stay friends. will he just pretend like nothing happened?

worry creeped in at the thought of being alone again without having anyone to talk to, even if the two of you did not talk much in school. however, others had noticed him occasionally staring at you during classes or breaks.

halfway through practising the presentation, curiosity and fear kicked in and you couldn’t help but blurt out

“woo what’ll happen to us after.. you know.. this?”

“what do you mean?”

“are we still gonna be.. friends?”

“why shouldn’t we be???”

“i don’t know.. i just thought.. maybe you wouldn’t have a reason to hang out with me anymore..”

“what?? you’re crazy. of course we can still be friends!! anyway let’s drop this subject and continue from where we left off.”

after hearing his words, you felt assured and relaxed. when another question popped into your head.

“woo? why do you like calling me so much?”

“i just... it’s just... weren’t we talking about the first phase of the cold war?” he cleared his throat.

“wooooooo~ you didn’t answer my question” you whined.

“how about we just focus on the project y/n?”

-

about half a year passed and you and wooyoung had soon become best friends. you facetimed each other everyday, talking about how your day went or ranting about the annoying teachers and classmates. you had told him about your parents, explaining why you were awkward and dry with people

what he didn’t know was that you had quickly developed feelings for him, but hiding it because you were scared of how he would react and afraid that you might lose your relationship with him.

it was one of the rare occasions when you were at his dorm, seated beside each other on the purple velvet sofa, just enjoying each other’s company while watching a movie.

“woo, remember when i asked you that question like. a while ago?”

“what question”

“why did you like calling me so much?”

“well... i... i... i guess i just had to do the history project with you?”

“we both know we could have just made a google document... so... why? i’m honestly soooo curious so just tell meeeeeee”

“fine. ijustlikedhearingyourvoiceiguess” he replied, cheeks turning pink.

“... you what”

“i just.. wanted to hear your voice you know?”

“oh”

“anyway y/n. what i’m trying to say is. i like you. a lot. i- i was scared to say this to you because i don’t want to lose our friendship but.. i don’t think i can keep this in anymore. i like you, y/n.”

gasping at his sudden confession and not knowing how to react, you just stared at him with wide eyes.

“ah shit i’ve screwed this up. i’m sorry y/n just. please ignore what i said.” he bit his lip.

“i... i- may or may not like you too?” you managed to squeak out, cheeks rosy.

suddenly, you felt a pair of lips on yours, eyes widening at his sudden movement. it was a short but sweet kiss, causing you to turn even redder than you already were.

“oh god y/n you don’t know how worried i’ve been about this. i’m so glad that you.. feel the same away about me!” he babbled.

“i..i’m afraid though, woo. what if... what if i lose you too? like i lost my parents.” your voice started to shake and tears welled up in your eyes at the thought of that.

he cupped your face in his hand, wiping your tears with his thumb.

“hey.. don’t say that alright? i’m here. i’m right here. i’m not leaving you.”

he pulled you in for a hug while you cried into his chest, letting the tears run. he held you in his arms until you stopped crying.

“how ‘bout i take you out on a date this saturday hm? how’s that sound?” he said, lifting your chin up so you would meet his eyes.

“great!�� you smiled softly, melting into his gaze.

the next two hours were just spent cuddling, your head pressed against his chest, breathing in his scent while your legs were tangled up and he played with your hair and left little kisses on your head. it was the first time in a long time you had felt so happy, heart fluttering and exploding because you knew, finally, you weren’t alone anymore. wooyoung was here. and that was all that mattered.

[luckcycler]

Spill the tea which of their outfits do you HATE 👀👀👀👀👀

Oh boy, I don’t know if I’m going to be ready for the hate Iget from this but my absolute loathing for some of the outfits is fueling me sohere goes. I’ll regret it later.

Disclaimer: I don’t hate the characters themselves when I say I hate the outfits. Also, this is completely my opinion. (Also don’t mind the typos, I am not great at writing)

These are in order btw

1      Shuichi

Oh god, okay. People who know me on discord know I whineabout his outfit allllll the time. I like Shuichi but his outfit makes me madfor several reasons. First of all, who in their right mind puts 3, THREEdifferent stripe designs on one outfit? What the fuck. That makes it verychaotic and those details makes it feel like the additional stripe patternswere just an afterthought because his outfit was so plain that they had to addsomething to it to make it more appealing.

That’s another problem, it’s just so plain… There is nothingelse than the hat on his silhouette to really make it interesting (and then heloses the hat, wow). One thing that you could argue with his outfit is that it’sbased on a boy’s school uniform and okay, that’s fair. But why? Why does it haveto be a school uniform? Some other characters don’t have school uniforms on. Ryoma,Angie, and Rantaro certainly don’t have school uniforms on. Rantaro looks likehe dropped out of school to pursue his dream of being in a boy band.

I mean the reason could be that he doesn’t want to get introuble for wearing something else than the school uniform but let’s be honest,all the uniforms of the cast members who actually wear them have all modifiedthem. I mean I’m pretty sure Miu’s uniform doesn’t require bdsm gear. Also, whowould tell an ultimate that you can’t wear whatever especially in a societythat bows down to talent. 

Play with his silhouette!! Give him a bigass coatdetectives have with a raised collar he can hide under because of his emotionalturmoil etc.

2      Kiibo

Yikes, you know what his outfit reminds me of? You knowthose Transformers designs from the Michael Bay movies that are so detailed andall over the place that you don’t really remember them otherwise than that theylooked cool I guess? That basically. 

The thing about making a memorable outfitis that you have to give it recognizable shapes and patterns our eyes canrecognize and therefore remember. It’s all just simple geometry. 

I like his raised collarwith the green led lights though. Otherwise, it just gives me nothing sadly. Also, I feel so bad for the person who had to draw all his sprites with all those unnecessary details.

3      Tenko

Oh boy, I probably don’t have to go too into this. It’s pretty obvious. From herpersonality and practicality side of things. Why would you give her a skirt?Why? You gave Hina shorts. You are capable of drawing women in pants. I want tobelieve in you, please. Nothing in her outfit really says martial artist whichis supposed to be the defining part of her design. I think I thought she wasthe ultimate sailor before she got introduced in the game.

I do like that her outfit feels more nautical and that’s mypersonal weakness because I love that aesthetic. I also like that the artist actuallyplayed with her silhouette with the bow! It’s a nice touch and I love the bow.Otherwise, her outfit is not practical, and I feel that it also sort of has toomany details that don’t really work together. Either lose the white hair ties orthe hairband.

4      Kokichi

Despite how much I draw this gremlin I don’t really like hisoutfit. I mean I don’t hate it, but I don’t like it either. But before I say anythingelse his promo picture hat can burn in hell and I’m going to pretend he neverhad it.

I do appreciate the symbolism his clothing has with the blackand white and the resemblance to a straight jacket giving a small nudge towardsa mastermind possibility. The checker pattern has become very iconic for himand also with his uniform looking ripped to indicate he is not very rich, nordoes he have a good upbringing. So I do get his outfit.

However, I do feel like it could’ve been better. I feel likein the cast as a whole there are too many characters with a black and whitecolor palette (Kirumi, Kokichi, Kiibo and Shuichi) making the whole cast look abit more washed out than the previous cast when it comes to color.

Also, his promo cape would have been a cool addition to hisoutfit in the game. It would’ve been fun!

In summary, I don’t mind the outfit but if I had the power, Iwould have dressed him like a fashionable clown.

5      Gonta

It’s just boring. I do get the whole Tarzan/gentleman aspectbut…it’s just so boring. Next.

6      Ryoma

This is the one I hate the least and I think this is more ofa problem with his build and that the cut of his clothes just don’t fit him. I love the leather jacket, I find it fitting of his character and cool. Ialso like the ankle cuff as a detail.

I do appreciate that the artist wanted to do something coolwith the hat but the shape is a bit odd, I feel like since he is a very roundcharacter, you have to either have more hard edges than just those two pointyparts to balance it out or just make the pointy parts round to go with the restof his design.

I do like the striped pants, but the shape is odd. It sortof looks like one of those toddler stocking thingies. He sure has some thunderthighs though.

These are the outfits I don’t like, the rest of the cast outfits I’m neutral on or I love a lot. 

To end this with a higher note and because I feel bad for bashing the dr designer so much (sorry). Personally, I think Kirumi’s outfit is amazing and fits her perfectly it’s one of my fav character outfits of all time! Especially the gloves I feel are so clever and it’s such a cool detail that I always think of them when I think of Kirumi. Her design to me is the best of the group next to Korekiyo, Himiko, and Angie.

[journeynaut]

This decade I went from being 14 to 24. From my understanding this means this decade has pretty much shaped my tastes, beliefs, and personality more than any other decade will. It’s also an important decade because at the beginning of the decade I felt like a real person, and now I feel like a ghost that occasionally almost inhabits the same space as this flesh prison.

Anyway, here’s a list of games that shaped me in reverse chronological order for maximum pretension. Spoilers and typos will be abundant. 

Red Dead Redemption 2 (2018)

I like little, mostly irrelevant prepping activities in games. Currently, I’m playing Death Stranding, and my Norman Reedus always puts on a cap. Mostly to cover up his weird little pony, but also just as a thing to do to focus before a mission. Like, listening to Friends in the Armed Forces by Thursday before the helicopter lands. Like, grabbing your wallet in the morning. Or, like in Arthur Morgan’s case, putting on a bandana before being a nasty crime boy.

Okay, maybe that’s not entirely true. I always play characters as good and pure as possible. But after I got done doing my good boy crimes I could always return to camp. Sure, camp was always moving as we ran, but the people were there every time. The world of RDR2 is beautiful, I think the characters were my favorite thing about this game. The entire plot was that camp, the outcasts in it, and the dreams they followed. They fused a cowboy simulator with a cult simulator. It says, don’t worry, friend - just keep going and Eden is the next job.

This is a game where you give, break, and are broken in pursuit of a lie. This is a game where your perfect life never arrives and the simple pleasures you find are taken. In the end, you only do whatever little bit of good you can, thank your horse for carrying your weight and the weight of everything you carry, and lay down to go peacefully.

Night in the Woods (2017)

This last decade took my memory from me. When I was a freshman in college taking an intro psych class, the class took a short term memory test. I got second in the whole class. Now I’m sitting here trying to remember who said what in this game. But regardless, one character says something like, “Getting older is your list of first times growing shorter while your list of never agains grows longer.” Heavily paraphrased, probably.

I think there’s a Bojack Horseman episode where he says, life is a series of closing doors, isn’t it? In our modern capitalist hell, very few don’t get trapped. This game understands that sometimes you can’t get out, and sometimes you just need to break some fluorescent bulbs at a dumpster. Or in my case, procrastinate on my life by playing this game while everything fell apart around me.

World of Warcraft: Legion (2016)

Tanking in WoW was my most fulfilling gaming experience of the decade. I wasn’t great, but I could be good occasionally. There are a few moments of genuine pride I can remember. Which, now that I think back, might be some of the last times I felt pride.

I had never played WoW or even an MMO before Legion, but everyone has to get into an MMO when they’re in college, right? So I got into it for about a year, and I played it way too much. So much so, I lost myself after I stopped, both personally and in games. It was hard for me to stick to any game for a long time after I stopped playing, and it honestly still is.

It wasn’t the tanking or the pride or the addictive design elements that kept me coming back - it was the people. This became a Return To game for me. Whether I was playing seriously or just goofing off, I would return to the trans mog shop in Stormwind. There were a few players who would gather consistently and talk between queues. I barely knew anything about these people but I spent hours there with them. There was my healer and best friend who I played with every day. There was the carpet layer from Hawaii. There was the player we always assumed was a young girl but turned out to be some rich man? And behind the anonymity of my characters I was able to comfortably interact with the regulars and the passerbys and mess with the assholes. I learned that pretending to be an actor playing someone else is the best way to talk to people.

Even though I barely knew these people they became friends in the modern way people become friends where you see them every day, but are also shocked to find out any detail of their personal lives. I often wonder what happened to all the people I played with. I never said bye to them or anything. I wasn’t planning on never playing again. One day it just happened.

I’ve often thought about playing again. When WoW Classic came out I thought about playing it. I’ve even thought about getting into FF14. But you can never go home, right? Some things that were good can’t be good again.

Inside (2016)

God, this is extremely my shit. I don’t have anything touching or personal to say about this. Every moment of this game is so tight and perfect, and the aesthetic is spot on. Run on, my child, go be one with your blob friends.

Or maybe I just like it because I too am a disgusting blob monster haunted by a dreary dilapidated landscape.

Firewatch (2016)

The plot of this game is messy overall, but I think about the character interactions all the time. This is a perfect example on how good dialogue isn’t realistic. It should be what we want reality to be. Henry and Delilah have such a believable relationship, strictly because I wanted to believe in it. I wanted to believe two people could always be so perfect and so witty.

And Firewatch just won’t let you believe in it. At the end you can beg and beg for Delilah to stay, and she won’t. The game gently pats you on the head, and says, sometimes people are too broken to be perfect with each other.

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (2015)

The PC version lets you set custom music to play as you drop in from the helicopter for your missions. This led to me hearing the beginning to Thursday’s Friends in the Armed Forces god knows how many times. Sure, maybe a 2009 emo song blaring out of a helicopter in 1980’s Afghanistan doesn’t exactly fit, but the mood fit. And it helped set the mood for the routine of going on missions.

Routine is what this game does so well. It’s an incomplete game with a not great story, and it fails at being a good Metal Gear Solid game. But the routine and mechanics blend together to create one of the best playing action games ever made. I never got tired of walking around my base, of boarding my helicopter to go drop into the desert, of launching random animals into the air with reverse parachutes.

This game also led to me formulating my Return To/Go Out theory of games, which I believe most games fall into. An old Mario game is a great example of a Go Out game. You never return anywhere; the princess is always in another castle. The Animal Crossing games maybe exist as the perfect example of a Return To game because you never even go out anywhere. You’re always there, where you mean to be. MGSV falls mostly on the Return To side of the spectrum, as it focuses on building up and managing your base and the people on it, something I’ll always be a sucker for.

Her Story (2015)

This is one of the last games that made me feel smart. As a person who feels chronically dumb as shit, that’s pretty rare. Sure, everyone in my life, and the university I went to, and all my grades say I’m not dumb. But we know that’s just because I tricked them all, and I’m actually a complete fool. But diving into this game’s wild and twisting non-linear story made me feel like a detective.

The Witcher 3 (2015)

Move out of the way Skyrim. The Witcher 3 was actually the best fantasy game of the decade. I played through all of The Witcher 2 in preparation for 3. I became so invested and involved with this universe. I feel like I should have so much more to say about this. In what was a very turbulent year of my life, this was the perfect escape. The world, writing, and characters are all so beautifully done. The DLC provides an emotional finale for the story. I never understood Gwent? But I did everything else in this game, and I still think about escaping into it again.

Also Triss for life.

Also also god, that show sucks shit though, doesn’t it?

Life is Strange (2015)

I love everything about Life is Strange. I love the melodrama, the stilted dialogue, the songs that still make me cry. I love the weird high school that resembles no high school ever. I’m not too much of a fan about what it says about me as a person though.

See, I let the entire town die to save Chloe. The crazy part is that I didn’t even think Max and Chloe were good together. When the game gave me a chance to kiss Chloe, I didn’t take it. I thought they had been apart too long, that they had too much personal baggage, that they were going through too much. But when the moment came I couldn’t let her go. I let the entire town get blown away to save her.

Transistor (2014)

Hey, do you want a cyberpunk, post-rock fueled, murder revenge love story?

Transistor had such an impact on me that Red and the Transistor are still my phone’s wallpaper and lockscreen. It’s the game I always mean to get around to playing again, but year after year I don’t. Maybe one day I will, or maybe that’s just what I tell myself about most things in life.

Regardless, this game acts as a perfect spiritual sequel to the studio’s first game, Bastion. In Bastion, everyone wanted to live in the perfect world that had been, but was now destroyed. In Transistor, the world exists - it’s there and could theoretically become whatever people want, and yet, no one wants to live in it. You’re not even trying to save the world; you want escape as much as anyone else. You just need revenge for the small part of your personal world that has been taken.

Also, at the end you get to basically fight yourself, and I’m such a sucker for when games have you fight someone with the same powers as you.

Gone Home (2013)

I had never been in love when I played this game. I thought I had, but being a teenager is dumb and weird. Of all the first times I wish I could experience again in games, this is up there on that list. Maybe even the top. Mainly because I understand love now, and I think it would make this game hurt more.

Both times I played Gone Home I sobbed, and I’m certain if I played it again, I would sob again. This was the first game to impact me in that way. As I’ve grown more and more dead inside, as I feel less and less, I seek those experiences out. Why yes, I would like to play whatever the sad new indie game is. Why yes, I would like to listen to that song that makes me emotional over and over. That scene in a show made me cry? Yes, I will absolutely watch it again.

Gone Home, like Spec Ops, taught me so much about what games could be and do. In a decade of walking simulators, Gone Home still stands out as one of the best.

Animal Crossing: New Leaf (2013)

Animal Crossing is the best goddamn game series of all time, and this is the best one because you can stack fruit.

Hotline Miami (2012)

I have never done cocaine in the 80’s, but that’s pretty much this game, right? This murder simulator game does something to your body on like, a visceral level. Imagine it’s like your 20th attempt on a level. Your hands are shaking with adrenaline, but you have a careful plan. It immediately goes bad so you just panic and start running around knifing fools and it somehow works out anyway. That’s the thing that makes this work so well, and also the thing the devs absolutely did not understand when they made Hotline Miami 2.

You know what else makes this game great? The vibes. Miss me with your vibe checks if you’re not putting off Hotline Miami vibes. It’s the trippy and psychedelic story, it’s the way you have to walk through the bodies of everyone you just murked at the end of the level, it’s the game constantly asking if you feel good about what you’re doing. Hotline Miami and Spec Ops made me reevaluate how I thought about violence in games. Which isn’t to say I don’t play violent games, just that I think more about what the games are asking me to do.

Borderlands 2 (2012)

My experience with Borderlands was different than how most people played it. I didn’t really uh, have friends, so I played it alone. But it wasn’t an inferior experience. I got to play my haiku spouting sniper at my own pace. All the guns were mine. I could laugh at the dumb jokes as long as I wanted.

Hey wait, actually, is this game still funny? If I thought it was extremely funny originally, would it still hold up? Like, Mr. Satan being Mr. Torgue still has to be funny, right?

Anyway, most of the DLC for this game is pretty mediocre or just straight up bad, but the Tiny Tina DLC is some of the best DLC of the decade. Those madmen just made D&D in a goofy ass game where guns yell at you when you shoot them, and somehow made it an emotionally resonant end to the story.

Spec Ops: The Line (2012)

We all really missed what this game was trying to tell us, huh? It constantly asks you if you’re okay with the dehumanization of minorities and the glorification of imperialism and the military that runs rampant through games. Here we are going into 2020, and goobers are still trying to argue games don’t have politics in them. Anyway, gamers are dumb as shit, and we should have listened to Spec Ops more.

Portal 2 (2011)

This came out at the beginning of this decade, huh? Guess I gotta break out the walker and sign up for AARP. Anyway, being funny is hard. I mean, I’ve never managed to be funny so I assume it’s hard. I mean, sometimes my life is funny in a cosmically ironic way, like I’m god’s personal clown and not in on the joke.

Anyway, anyway, the puzzles are fantastic, and Portal 2 is funny as hell in a way I’m pretty sure would still hold up. The humor is definitely more overt than the original Portal, but Cave Johnson is a god tier character. I can’t remember what I did yesterday, and I still remember Cave Johnson lines from like, 8 years ago.

Minecraft (2011)

*twirls mustache* Not to sound like a hipster, but I started playing Minecraft in 2010 before release. My first world seed was the most perfect seed I ever encountered. It was a large island, the size of which, I never encountered again. Like, it was big enough that it felt like I had to branch out to explore, but also small enough that I could know it all. Playing on that island was the most pure experience I had with Minecraft, in retrospect. I didn’t know what I was doing, and I didn’t realize that actually everyone else was way better at building things and playing the game than I was.

But eventually you get bored of everything, right? So I found a server and joined the forums. Over time I grew a bit bored of the game, and eventually realized I wasn’t very good at it. But I stuck around on the forums. Like, for years. Playing on that server, even as my time actually playing lessened, and being on the forums defined my teenage years.

I had a complicated relationship with the forums and the game, though. I’m not good with people. That’s just something I’ve had to learn to accept. But I’ve actually gotten better over the years. Back during my teenage years I was awful with people. I was antisocial, standoffish, pretentious, etc. I also felt like I couldn’t get anyone to like me, which I now realize was my own fault. There was a group of players I wanted to be a part of, but also could never really break into. The game and forums became what I was experiencing and also everything I couldn’t experience. It’s what I did every day but also what I was missing out on. Even today my thoughts on Minecraft are complicated. That one song, you know the one, always makes me emotional.

I originally had a different end planned to whatever this list is. It was gonna be a pretentious ending about how a few years ago I tried to go back and play Minecraft but just couldn’t because you can never go home again. I was gonna talk about my first world seed and the optimism and exploration I experienced, and it was obviously gonna mimic my decade. Because, you know, pretentiousness. But I can’t do that now.

See, I just looked up that server, and I found out it’s still active. The website looks like when I left. The same people are in charge. It’s like a time capsule. Due to a lot of personal turmoil, I asked for a server ban and a forum ban to stop myself getting back on in January 2015. That was when my time with Minecraft came to an end. But here’s the crazy thing: a couple of weeks ago, almost 5 years after I quit, someone posted on my forum profile that they missed me. And we weren’t even close friends, I thought. I mean, no one liked me, right? And it wasn’t just this one person. Multiple people had left similar messages on my profile over the years.

Normally I don’t like when people have memories and perceptions of me. Like, hell is other people, right? But this kind of hurt my insides deep down, like nothing has in a while. I don’t quite have words for it because it’s so personally tied to how I felt about Minecraft, and thus the forums, and thus a lot of this decade. Does this mean that multiple people I’ve encountered over the decade miss me? That some amount of people greater than zero miss me not being around?

Anyway, this has gotten off track, but also maybe it hasn’t. The point I was trying to make was to make a pretentious list about how silly little things we do in our free time can affect us years later in ways we won’t realize and sometimes can’t understand.

In conclusion, games track better with the most personal moments of my decade better than almost anything. Games are great. The people who play them are often terrible. Video games forever.

[ahnsael]

@kjuw89 replied to your photo: “Isn’t she beautiful?”:

Crowds look light ��

They’re not bad. I was surprised to see 15 minutes for Pirates. On the Disney Parks App it then said that HyperSpace Mountain had a 20 minute wait, but it had just returned to 104 status after going 101 (for you non-cast members, that means it was working again after having broken down), and by the time I got there from Big Thunder it was up to 55 minutes and no Single Rider Line. I got a FastPass for 9:10-10:10pm, but then gave that up for a Small World FastPass that would be valid by the time I walked from Galaxy’s Edge instead when I decided I didn’t have the energy to stay that late today.

The highest I saw Smuggler’s Run was also 55 minutes, and that and HyperSpace Mountain were the two longest waits in the park. It was warm today (even though I heard people complaining about how cold it was when I left -- it was predicted to be in the mid-60s at the time, so I’m guessing they’re SoCal people -- we’re already down to the 30s at night back home, which is probably why I found a scorpion in our garage yesterday; it’s still warm enough during the day, but it’s cold at night and our garage is still warm -- also I used my blacklight that I use for IDs and large bills at work and saw that the thing about them glowing green under black light is true), but when i walked by Splash Mountain on the way to the Hungry Bear and then Galaxy’s Edge, the wait was only 30 minutes.

I forgot to mention Star Tours and the Jedi Thingy in the Captain EO theater on my list of things I did today, too. I walked in to Star Tours and waited less than 5 minutes on Standby. It was weird to see that the Star Trader is pretty much all Star Wars merch now (it used to just be the small part by the Star Tours exit into the gift shop). There was also a huge selection of Star Wars pins on Main Street in the music store (which is now mostly a pin store). So much Star Wars in areas of the park other than the Star Wars par!I

I also happened to time the Jedi thing just right after finding out the Space Mountain wasn’t doing single rider but hearing the announcement that the doors to the theater were opening.

I was one of literally three people in the theater, and I was really only there to sit in the old seats and pretend I was watching Captain EO. The cast member didn’t even bother with the microphone; he just stood in front of us and did his spiel “in person” to us.

I wasn’t exactly wowed by Smuggler’s Run. I was told to watch for flashing buttons and push them (I was an engineer, the last row), and I was focused on that for the first part of the ride until I realized that the bright green flashes were enough to get my attention if I wasn’t looking.

The down side: Without spoiling the story, there were two times I was supposed to press something specific (and two other times to hit a couple other things -- there wasn’t a lot of interactivity for the engineer position). The first time I pressed the button and it had the desired effect; the second time, I pressed it, but it stayed lit, and Hondo kept yelling at me to press it, no matter how many times I pressed it. I could see the other Engineer (another single rider) having the same issue at the same time.

The lady who grouped us asked me whether I was a rebel or part of the Empire, and I told her honestly, “I don’t know, I just walked into Galaxy’s Edge and came here.” And since I was a single rider, I don’t think anything would have been “remembered” for me anyway as they advertised when the land opened.

Another issue was the Play Disney Parks app.When I first opened it, I allowed location services only while the app is open...turns out you can’t get “achievements”  unless they’re always on (any time you turn the phone screen off, the app starts from scratch when you reopen it). And for the life of me, I couldn’t find a way to go back and change my preferences. Maybe it’s outside the app in the phone’s app settings.

Oh, and they still have the typo on the sign at the entrance to the Haunted Mansion display in the Opera House on Main Street. It still says “Kindly step all the way in to the explore eerie evolution of the Haunted Mansion’s design” instead of “Kindly step all the way in to explore the eerie evolution of the Haunted Mansion’s design” (emphasis mine -- I tried posting it earlier from the Opera House, but Disneyland’s wifi keeps going in and out and if you thought I posted a lot today, just imagine if half of them hadn’t failed due to a lost connection!). That typo has been there for months, I believe. Disney has its own sign shop. It’s an easy fix. They just haven’t done it. Has nobody actually told them? Would I be a jerk to mention it?

The only other thing that I was disappointed in was that when I got dinner at the Hungry Bear, the cashier asked whether I wanted fries, slaw, or onion rings. I chose the rings.

And then when I got my receipt, I noticed that I was charged an extra 50¢ for that choice, then saw on the menu that it said “includes fries or slaw” (onion rings appeared nowhere on the menu, even as a side dish). Seemed a dirty trick to not mention the upcharge when offering it. It is, at the very least, a sneaky upcharge

But...let’s be honest, if she had said “would you like fries or slaw, which are included, or would you like to substitute onion rings for 50¢ more?” I still would have chosen the onion rings. It’s not a ridiculous upcharge, I just think it should be mentioned at the time.

But overall, it’s been so long that things that used to drive me up a wall were...pretty much okay today.

When I was in line for Pirates, there was a lady ahead of me with a young (2 or 3 years old I think) daughter, and she was having a heck of a time keeping her daughter from wandering off, or bumping into those of us around her, etc. That used to drive me crazy.

And maybe it’s because I’m an uncle now and understand the struggle better, but...all I could think was “Hey, at least she’s trying. Besides, what kid DOESN’T do these things?”

I was more bummed about the group who tried to sneak past me in the FastPass line of Big Thunder (the cast member at the merge point saw this and made them wait until I was ahead of them, bless him), the people behind me in line for Pirates who were old enough to understand the concept of personal space but still kept walking into me, and the family in front of me waiting at the FastPass merge point at Small World who kept giving their 1-2 year old daughter an empty Coke bottle, just for her to throw it down again -- one of those times at my head (and instead of stopping giving it to her to throw, tried to tell her to throw it in another direction without so much as a “sorry ‘bout that”). But to the cast member’s credit, the one watching the merge point -- while not showing perturbation at the situation (her Disney smile game was strong), when she let us in she sent that family to one line and the rest of us around them to another line, and gave a brief but noticeable (to me) look of “I got you, fam.”

I had all these plans for what the first thing I was going to do was when I got there. The thing I did was the thing I didn’t plan, but I’m okay with it...I wandered some of the shops on Main Street. Partly, I was looking for a hat, since I didn’t bring one (I brought sunscreen, but...getting sunburned, then shaving my head, can result in “hairless dandruff” -- the peeling skin just being made to look awful by a razor passing over it). I may buy this one tomorrow:

Overall, though, I wasn’t a big fan of the hat selections available.

But I went into the Magic Shop (take that, Magic Kingdom, Disneyland still has a Magic Shop) wanting to buy a Hot Rod. I found it on the shelf right as the cast member started asking if he could help me with anything. I told him that the Hot Rod was the first magic trick I ever bought in that store as a kid and the first “real” magic trick I ever learned (this is true), and he said “And it’s still a great classic trick.” (If you want a cast member who knows every last bit of their merchandise, experience over the last 30+ years tells me this is the store you want to be in.)

I bought it (I have a guest at my casino that it’s going to blow away, even though it’s one of the easiest tricks to perform).

There’s a sculpture (probably about 6-7″ tall) of Peter Pan riding Peter Pan’s Flight that’s surprisingly only $55, and I may get that too. There was a great lithograph of the organist in the Haunted Mansion for $40...the problem with wall art is that for everything I put up, depending on the size, I have to choose one or two attraction posters to take down.

There’s probably more that I’m going to have to choose between (or order online later since they’re on shopdisney), and part of me is worried that, since I would do Package Pickup rather than carry the things (other than the hat) around all day, I might forget to actually pick them up on the way out. I could have them shipped, but I don’t know how much that would cost.

Today was more or less my test run -- if I was so exhausted by the end that the walk back to the hotel was a pain, I was going to pay the $25 parking fee and drive in tomorrow. But even after all that time awake, the walk takes less than a half hour. And once I crossed Harbor and then Disney Way and started walking down Disney Way, there was only one other pedestrian with me (it was a madhouse from the exit to that point -- I was far from the only one leaving early, but even though I never understood leaving early when I was younger and had more energy...I get it, especially for people with multi-day passes).

I wore a PeopleMover T-shirt, and one of the cast members at Hungry Bear complimented me on it, so that was good (I thought about wearing my T-shirt of an anthropomorphic Pluto walking a non-anthropomorphic Goofy, but decided I didn’t want a bunch of kids asking their parents questions about it; when I left work this morning I chose an understated WED Enterprises T-shirt, but even with my A/C on for the whole drive down, I was a sweaty mess when I got here and I wasn’t going to subject people to that).

My shirt choices for tomorrow: the aforementioned Pluto/Goofy shirt, a shirt that is a parody of “The Jerk” movie poster but with Goofy taking Steve Martin’s place and the title changed to “The Goof,” or a Captain R3X T-shirt.

Honestly, it’s probably between “The Goof” and Captain R3X. The other one might freak people out more than I would like.

Oh, and I have to look into Oga’s Cantina. Earlier I saw a reservation available for tomorrow evening, but...when it asked me to authorize a credit card guarantee, I wasn’t sure what I was agreeing to (I know they charge you if you don’t show up, but...how much? And am I just guaranteeing being able to go in and have a drink and enjoy the ambiance, or am I required to buy a certain dollar amount of things, like the $200 you’re committing to when you reserve building a light saber or a droid?).

Speaking of which, I saw a LOT of people, in my 3½ hours there today, carrying around “custom droid” boxes.

Not that I’m surprised a lot of people are getting them, I’m just surprised they’re not having them held for package pick-up at the end of the day, choosing instead to carry them around.

The things I did learn today: I do NOT miss driving in Southern California. You know you’ve reached Southern California when the left lane is street racers holding racers through heavy traffic, when people are diving from lane to lane to try and find the fastest way to their destination, when people randomly slow down to 10 below the limit, then accelerate to 10 over when you try to go around them, and just the general feeling of claustrophobia of being in a sea of so many bad drivers that you have to scan them all to try to anticipate what stupid thing they’re going to do next so you can react before they do it because if you wait for it to happen, it’s gonna be too late.

I also learned that driving down on Highway 395 sucks. For more than half the time, it’s one lane in either direction (passing lanes are few and far between, and in the daylight there’s that “is that the water-mirage effect, or a semi coming? I have a dotted line and I can legally pass, but I literally have no idea whether it’s safe to do so and I am NOT dying on the way to Disneyland). And there is a TON of road construction (a good 25 miles is one lane TOTAL, with them alternating directions in that one lane).The whole area around Victorville is a complete mess. At the intersections (of which there are many), they open up to two lanes for the last couple hundred feet prior to the intersection, just to go back to one lane afterwards. Which means that a LOT of people who have been frustrated for 100 miles or more about their inability to pass are trying everything they can to cheat the system and get ahead somehow before the road goes back to one lane.

Don’t get me wrong, we have plenty of jerk drivers in northern Nevada. But traffic is sparse enough that I see, at most, five jerks a day. Most nights it’s just one, some nights none (the advantage of working graveyard is there aren’t a lot of people on the road, and we’re a small enough town that even “rush hour” means going 15 in a 25 zone at worst). But in SoCal, there are so many selfish drivers that it just...wow. It’s a lot to deal with when I haven’t dealt with it in so long (and since I’ve never driven south from the 395 to the 15 to the 60 to the 57 before, so it was all new road to me -- this was literally my first time traveling more than 3 miles south on 395 since I moved to Nevada, and that’s the highway my casino is on). The claustrophobia, when I knew I had no possible out if anything happened, was scaring me.

It’s great to be back. I mean, I’m home at Disneyland. It’s also going to be great to leave and get back to a small town in rural Nevada.

Oh, but I may be meeting up with disfan tomorrow. He hasn’t posted in almost a year here (hence why I’m not tagging him), but I met him in person six years ago at my third most recent trip (this current one being the most recent, then going with an old friend in 2015 where I didn’t see disfan then that third-most recent one in 2013), and it would be great to see him again. I’m still in touch with him from time to time, and when I thought I had a date he offered to do something to help make it special, and while the date thing didn’t work out (I got a text from her while I was on the road saying that she was “getting ready” but nothing since then, even tonight when she knows for sure she missed the boat to It’s a Small World -- I waited 30 minutes longer than I wanted to to leave in case she showed -- though I showed up just about 30 minutes after check-in time so it wasn’t too bad, since a review of my hotel on Travelocity said they charge extra for early check-in even if the room is ready and I don’t know if that would apply if I had missed some traffic and arrived 15 minutes early -- but her text was after I had already given up on her and gotten on the road -- her text was in reply to one I sent at the time we were supposed to meet asking if she was on her way, her reply came over 20 minutes later that she was “getting ready” but since I was driving I didn’t see that until I got here because I’ve learned no to do other things and drive), disfan was a gem. So...I hope I do get to see him tomorrow.

And if any of you Disneyland people who I know on here happen to be going to the parks Tuesday, send me an ask (I’m mostly mobile, though I am on a laptop at the moment, so an ask should show up on my notifications...but maybe to play it safe, add an X to the end of my tumblr name and make it gmail and get in touch with me that way.

I really do enjoy doing the park on my own (which is probably why I didn’t call her instead of text her when she wasn’t there -- plus there was some drama the morning before involving her roommate and I’m worried that may be a regular thing, so I might have self-sabotaged this “date” a little bit by not trying harder than I normally would with someone who I genuinely do like). But I also like doing the park with friends, and if we’re mutuals here we’re already friends (or if you follow me and I don’t follow you and you want to show me that we could be friends that works too), send an email.

I’ll be in the park most of the day (I can’t promise I’m gonna rope-drop it, because my Wednesday/Thursday is gonna be a LONG day driving home and getting there just about in time to shower and get ready for work, then I have a 9am meeting on Thursday, so I’ll have been up since whenever I get up and check out on Wednesday to get back up to Nevada for work), but I’m staying at least through the Electrical Parade. I don’t care about a projection-only show instead of fireworks, and there’s no Fantasmic!, but...the Electrical Parade will be good memories.

Oh, and Laughing Stock, Co. was listed in the times guide that I picked up today (as a “Fri-Sat” thing, no mention that those were their last shows; they’re gone now).

Anyway, my phone (barely) made it the 3½ hours tonight (and that included a live broadcast on Facebook of my ride on Small World from the front row -- which Facebook says they’ve “partially muted” due to the use of copyrighted music, but the song “It’s a Small World” was never copyrighted -- it was written for UNICEF, copyright-free, as a gift to the children of the world.

Oh, and when I rode Small World, they were grouping two boats at once on the same side (that’s “bote” to you, Ian...unless only “botes” with names like Irrawaddy Lady qualify for that title). But as I was the first grouped into the second boat, and the cast member just said “row 1″ which put me with two other people (that row can comfortable fit three), I waited until he was done grouping and then asked whether I was in the boat with the two other people, or waiting for the next boat.

Hey, I was ODV. I can make you a great churro or box of popcorn (I really need to get some popcorn tomorrow -- a Disneyland trip isn’t complete without it), but I don’t know a thing about balancing boats.

At first, he just said “You’re in the second boat.”

And then, after a few seconds, he said “The only way you’d be in their row with them is if you were in their party.”

And...I got it. They were both ladies (one young, one older), and he was saying “we’re not going to put some strange guy in there sitting next to them.”

The only response I had was “that’s probably for the best.” Because he was looking out for his lady guests by not putting some strange guy next to them.

I mean, I know I’m not a danger to anyone with whom I may ride It’s a Small World, but he doesn’t know that. And he acted accordingly, and I dig that. Plus, it gave me a chance to balance y phone on the front lap bar (since I was the only one in the front row on my boat).

Must-dos for tomorrow:

HyperSpace Mountain

The Jungle Cruise

Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Eye (single rider, hopefully -- I’ve already translated everything in the queue)..

Peter Pan’s Flight (but probably only if I can book a FastPass)

Waiting in the Standby Line for Smuggler’s Run(I hear the queue is amazing, but the single-rider queue is just a series of hallways and stairs).

Haunted Mansion Holiday (even though Jack should have his own darned attraction by now and leave the Haunted Mansion alone).

Splash Mountain (maybe last? I have a bad habit of being placed in Row 1 and I tend to make the front end heavy and the splashes are huge -- especially for me, and I’m gonna have my cell phone on me)

A grand circle tour on the Disneyland RR

Walt Disney’s Enchanted Tiki Room (this was what I thought I would do first today, but I worried about staying awake...last time I saw the show was the abbreviated version at Walt Disney World so it will be nice to see it in full again).

The Submarine Voyage with Finding Nemo (I had no interest in that but I’ve seen a thing on how they did it that I want to check out, but also part of it is still underwater so I want to try it).

The Sleeping Beauty Castle walkthough

The PeopleMover (that one’s not gonna happen it’s been gone for over 20 years and I am NOT risking a lifetime ban to go up and try to walk the track that is still there)

Matterhorn Bobsleds

All Fantasyland dark rides

Meet a nice lady and invite her to dinner at some place not Blue Bayou, since that’s booked, but maybe somewhere nicer than the corn dog cart (just kidding -- I couldn’t even get a seemingly nice lady to join me for a trip to Disneyland, even though I had one day’s cost covered through a friend and was willing to foot the bill for the other and I had made it clear that the room I booked had two beds [which it does] and that “things” would not happen UNLESS SHE WANTED AND INITIATED IT [I PROMISE I’M NOT BITTER about her not showing AS I SAID I MAY HAVE SELF-SABOTAGED THAT BY NOT TRYING HARDER TO GET TO TO COME WITH ME WHEN SHE DIDN’T RESPOND TO MY LAST MINUTE TEXT but the concept of dating as daunting; forgive the self-pity but I’d actually have to be worth it for a date to happen and I’m wasn’t worth it to her).

Walt Disney’s Enchanted Tiki Room (I’m back to “things I must do now)

Dole Whip

Maybe the lobster roll from Harbour Galley?

Popcorn

Maybe stopping my rambling for a minute (y’all know that isn’t gonna happen -- if you didn’t see it, it’s because Disney’s wifi crapped out again and I thought I posted it but it never posted).

But seriously, if any of y’all are there and want to meet, I would throw out every one of these to spend time with you (I’m so lonely!).

[imma-lil-teapot]

Each TMNT Incarnation and Where They Stand With Me :)

(Nervous chuckle) ... Yeah no, I suck at titles. Moving on! 

Y’all can go ahead and skip this part if you’re not interested in senseless rambling and just wanna get to the TMNT fun~ ;) 

Soooooo, I’ve recently updated my Tumblr page to a blog dedicated to all my fandoms (musing, headcanons, writing, gifs, pics, the works, basically anything and everything in relation to them) since I wasn’t really ever doing anything with it other than using it to share pics mostly. But ever since I stumbled back into the TMNT fandom, I’ve been searching Tumblr for fan content and OMGOSH, did I hit the jackpot! Headcanons, fanfics, Turtle x reader stories, so much juicy stuff! Am hooked! Dunno why I never tried searching for similar stuff in the past for my other fandoms! I guess I just... didn’t realize there was so much content here. :O But anyway, I always wanted a place to share ideas and thoughts regarding my fandoms outside of sites like Deviantart and Fanfiction.net, and heck, it’s been here under my nose all this time... Y’all gonna have to forgive me; I’m an old fart. ;P (Insert image of Slowpoke for reference) So without further ado... 

LET’S GET THIS PIZZA PARTY STARTED! 

Imma start this blog off really simple and, as the title states, just give you all a small-ish idea of where each TMNT universe stands (or ranks?) with me, personally... Note the ‘personally’ part so please don’t feel offended if I don’t share the same opinion as you on a particular verse. ^^; I have my own tastes and will respect the next person’s when it comes to them. ;) Also, please beware the typos (which there most definitely will be)...

IN RELEASE DATE ORDER: (Hopefully they’re right)

MIRAGE COMICS~

Imma just say it: I haven’t read any of them yet. :/ There probably are sites out there that would allow you to view them online for free, but in truth, I’ve been a little slack about trying to find any... That may however change someday as I always tell myself I should really seek out the source material so it’s only a matter of time. What I do know, however, is that they’re of course a lot darker than most incarnations (which I don’t have a problem with personally) and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious as to exactly how much darker. X’D The closest I’ve come to ‘knowing’ these Turts comes from watching the Turtles Forever movie and they weren’t in it for a long time so it’s very difficult to say what they actually mean to me, so we’ll just put these guys down in the ‘not sure’ column for now. ;)

1987 CARTOON~

HAHA~ I think any fan of the franchise as a whole knows this little gem! The series that really hit it off and spawned over a 190 eps! Quite an impressive feat for a Saturday morning cartoon! It made its way to TVs the year before I was born, but it would take another few before it would reach our tubes (we’re always a few years behind the rest of the world :/ ) so I was around four when I was first introduced to it and needless to say, I loved it back then! Michelangelo was initially my fav due to him being my older brothers’ fav and the one they mainly spoke of, but it didn’t take long before my favering gravitated towards Leonardo (even at such a young age) and has been that way ever since. ;) But where exactly does the series stand with me as an adult nowadays with so many other verses we’ve been exposed to? I do hold a lot of nostalgia (as many older do) for it, and I mean, come on, that theme song is ageless, and I even started watching a lot of vids involving the original VAs and the shenanigans they get up to and seriously, it’s so heartwarming and fun to see them! But I have to be honest...

It’s not my fav verse, honestly. I will always adore them, of course, because of the nostalgia and the goofiness... But it’s the latter that’s mostly the reason for it being placed a bit lower on the favoritism ladder. While its a fun watch if you want something lighthearted, I still prefer the idea of the darker undertones that comes with being associated with ninjas. It’s just a preference. Plus, the Turtles designs are big one for me, and I’m sorry to say, but I keep seeing these fellas as more frog-like than turtle, despite the shells. X’D So yeah, no big reasoning for it, and even if someone were to ask me if I like these guys, I’ll still say yes, just that they’re not my ultimate fav is all. ;)

Also, we won’t talk about the Japanese Anime Ninja Turtles: Superman Legend or something to that extent... We’ll just let that one be gently swept under the carpet. ;) Only ever saw the trailer for it and that’s all I’ll ever need to see in my lifetime.

1990 MOVIES TRILOGY~

Now funny enough, I really don’t remember ever seeing these movies as a kid, though it’s possible I did and just maybe blocked the memory, but I highly doubt it... So yeah, I saw these movies as an adult already. The first is praised by most fans, and honestly, I can see why: it’s pretty good! :D The acting is very decent and the humour’s brilliant! The two sequels... not so much but still okay. ;) Where they sit with me... Not too far on the ladder again I’m afraid. :/ While I do really enjoy and appreciate the acting and that humour (”I made a funny.” X’D) it mostly comes down to the Turtles designs again... I really can’t see past them being actors in costumes rather than characters. :’( Granted, good actors. ;) And heck, Jim Henson did a phenomenal job! They’re just not really the movies for me is all, even if I do go back and watch ‘em every now and then. X’D I do however melt every time at the scene in the first movie where Raph wakes up in the bath and Leo’s there and apologizing and all... Makes me all gooey inside! X’D The feels are real! Speaking of Leo, though, he sounds even younger than Mikey. Small nitpick, that, but... why? X’D

But yeah, let’s just say, they’re good movies, just, not my favs.

Also, Coming Out Of Their Shells tour... Yeah, I’m gonna just... pretend that doesn’t exist for a minute. 

THE NEXT MUTATION~

Nope.

Saw one ep as a kid and am not interested in seeing anymore.

Although, VA Matt Hill voices Raph. That’s one good thing.

2003/2k3~

Well it wasn’t already apparent by my avatar... Ladies and gents, I present to you... My fav TMNT verse to date! Oh my goodness, where do I even begin with this delicious series?! :D Firstly, animation: so appealing, comic book-y style! Their designs: without sounding pervy, veeeeeeeery appealing (hehehehehe), no seriously, they sometimes have a bitta bulk to them but it honestly works, and dem muscles, and the cool eyes! The VAs: spot on! Perfect! Wouldn’t have ‘em any other way! Make me melt, Mr. Michael Sinterniklaas~ (cough) Their personalities: Omgosh, just yes! So perfect! They’re easily differentiated and yet still work together so well. Leo’s mature and level-headed (well, most of the time ;P ) yet still gets tested a lot and even has a fun side that’s shown on occasion. Raph’s grouchy and violent but is shown on more than one occasion that’s he’s total softie and really does care. Don’s just a sweetheart and freakishly smart and even has slips ups from time to time. Mikey... omgosh, best Mikey ever! So much fun! So hilarious! And just a bundle of energy, but not at all an idiot like he’s sometimes portrayed in other verses. He’s witty, mischievous and just so adorable! Heck, even Master Splinter, April, Casey, the lot of them are just awesome in this series! And wow, they really do lean more towards the source material (or so I’m told) when it comes to the plots! It’s darker than the other previous verses yet still remaining kid-friendly (although I question it at times XD) and omgosh, it’s just everything I want in a TMNT universe! Granted, it’s not perfect perfect, but it nailed it for me. ;) It really showed so lovely character developments, alsortsa different genres, the humour will leave you in stitches, the Turts are all just so lovable, I can’t get enough of them! This series was really my high point and I’ve yet to find one that tops it~

Btw, this even includes Fast Forward and Back to the Sewer (BTTS). The former being my least fav of the series simply due to the setting and again, it’s just preference. I even liked BTTS, even though I’m not overly fond of a cyberspace setting, but I found myself really liking the art style and the general plot. :D 

2007/2k7~

As with the last, if you’ve picked up on the page’s header/banner, you’d have probably guessed that the 2007 movie is also a good candidate for one my favs... And you’d be correct. ;) I’m actually very fond of this movie, and it’s largely due to the Turtles designs. I love how they were done! They just look so cool! <3 Subtle differences tell the viewer who’s who even if they didn’t have a mask or weapons. The VAs were also pretty good~ Now, the story isn’t the greatest, I’ll admit. Personally I thought it was okay, but know many fans think otherwise. But I did like the confrontation between Leo and Raph! It got real there, peeps! :O Now here’s also where it falls a little on its face for me: I didn’t really like how they handled Leo’s personality (if you haven’t already picked up on it, yes, I’m a Leo fangirl and I’m picky when it comes to how they handle his personality) but it’s a nitpick again, yet, I still feel compelled to state my opinion: the whole “I’m better than you.” comment really took me back and made me think they pushed it. I honestly like to believe he’d never actually say something like that... at least, 2003!Leo wouldn’t. X’D But that’s just my problem: I’m comparing a different verse’s Leo to this one and whether I like it or not, he said it. :/ Oh well, it still made for some fun action scenes and I’ll still always like the movie.

Bit of a goof on my side: I honestly thought that this movie was made to tie in with the 2003!verse due to the timeline in which it was produced, but turns out, it’s actually closer to the 1990′s timeline although still considered it’s own verse.

2012/2k12~

Oooh boy, lemme prepare for the backlash real quick... I’m uhhhh... not a fan of these boys. :/ I don’t mind them, but I’m honestly never gonna watch the series again. It’s hard to top your fav when you’ve kinda already hit your high point, ya know. Now before you light your torches and sharpen your pitchforks, hear me out: I will never bash the series, or make fun of anyone who likes it! Or anything to that extent! It’s just wasn’t for me, plain and simple, and it’s got nothing to do with it being ‘new’ or I’m just an old fart stuck in my ways. Heck, If you’re still reading, you would’ve found out that even nostalgia couldn’t beat the series that grasped me in my teens! So no, it has nothing to do with age. But if you do need a reason: I wasn’t overly fond of how they handle the characters. For one, they look and act a bit too young, Mikey is just... wow, something else. Donnie’s... sheesh, pretty snappy and antagonising. Raph’s well... okay, he’s meant to be angry half the time, and they did give him some more layers with Spike and Mona Lisa and whatnot, but he still kinda never learns his lesson if I can say that? He’ll learn that he shouldn’t cause issues with others, yet next episode he’s back at it again. :/ Leo’s... wow, just not like other Leos. X’D Best way I can describe him is... young? Very childlike. And even when he was progressing to becoming this better leader, I honestly couldn’t even see the change. My mind was just stuck on this “He’s a babeh.” notion. Also, I’m not even gonna start on this April and Casey. Just. No. Most of the characters were annoying and I just kept seeing recycled plot after plot. What I did like was the romance that blossomed between Raph and Mona (albeit far too rushed) and even Donnie liking April was adorable (but seriously Donnie, you can do so much better), and there were some really heartfelt moments, like Splinter telling Leo to leo his brothers with his heart and not his head, and the scenes when they were Tots will always make me squeal... But yeah... without leaving any spoilers.... about Splinter... just... thanks, Nickelodeon. Y’all know what I mean. Not once... But twice.... Really? So yeah, look, I realized some of those reasons might even be petty, but again, it’s just not the series for me, but anyone who’s a fan... You keep being a fan! ;) I’m glad you can enjoy something I can’t. ;)

2014/2k14/2016/2k16 AKA BAYVERSE~

HAHA~ Every fan’s favorite... If only. X’D Jokes aside, despite many fans claiming the Bay movies ruined the franchise, these two films gathered a small following... And I’m apart of it. :) Funny enough, I honestly didn’t know what to think of them when the movie first came out. I think I was just taken aback by the sheer amount of detail and all that went into their designs. I didn’t not like them, but again, their designs were a lot to take in. :O Even now after seeing the movies quite a few times over, I find myself constantly discovering something I didn’t notice on them before, be it a strap or a scar etc. And it honestly took some getting use to their sizes, I mean, sheesh! :O Not to mention the different background story, and Megan Fox’s wooden, expressionless acting, but despite all that... I found myself actually growing attached to these hulks of Turtles. They still have a lot of that heart in them and plus they’re just so much fun, I mean, can we say ‘Elevator scene’? X’D Now again, not perfect by anys mean, but still fun and pretty decent incarnations to add to the franchise. Again, Leo’s been given this ‘Better than you’ a bit which irked me to be frank. Not always but it’s there sometimes, but otherwise alright. Raph’s a decent Raph. Even had some tender moments. Donnie’s adorable! X’D This slightly potty mouthed geek that you just gotta love. And Mikey... although given that bitta ‘idiot’ feel, is also just as lovable and you want to hug him every time he’s onscreen! 

In short, I like ‘em. :) They’re actually closer to the top of the ladder than some others.

RISE OF THE TMNT/ROTTMNT/2018/2K18~

Yeeeeeeeeuuuuuuh... no. Sorry. Not for me. :/ Again, gonna remind y’all, nothing to do with age. Nothing to do with change. I will say that the fluid animation is nice, and the fact that they chose 2D animation. :) Buuuuuut, wow, they were certainly a lot to take in. Almost as much as Bay’s Turtles. After watching a few eps, I will conclude that they really just aren’t what I’m looking for. I found that the constant joking, while sometimes funny, got a little bit much, plus such short eps. Raph being leader was a switch and one that took awhile to get use to and honestly, I’m just not for it, I don’t even know where to begin with Donnie, Mikey’s okay, Leo... (deep breath) I don’t know what they were thinking... Let’s not even go to Master Splinter. But anyways, I get that change was what they were going for and that it was more so based on the 1987 toon with the silliness so that’s fine. I’m glad it’s got so many fans. :) And honestly, I wanna end off just by saying...

That no matter what your thoughts on what I’ve said, I hope you can respect my opinions and choices cause at the end of the day, they’re just my own, and I will always respect yours! :D If you adore the verses I’m not too crazy about, that’s great! :D I want you all to love the heck out of them! And honestly, this is what’s so great about this franchise: there are so many verses to choose from! So many options and tastes to suit any and all! You don’t have to follow the masses! You go enjoy whichever incarnation(s) you want to! ;) 

And there we have it, my first fandom bloggy thingy~ Hope there’ll be many more where that came from! :D

This is Drag0n-Mistr3ss signing off~

[wwenhlimagines]

"Baby, I'm back!" - Finn Balor

Requested by @rebelfleur22.

6 months ago

I was playing with the new face paint I got when I decided to try a Finn Balor faced demon look on the left side of my face while making my right side up with my usual makeup. I finished off the last few spots of paint on the left side of my face and then set up my phone to take a few pictures of me. I took a few photos including an over the shoulder look, a smiling Too Sweet pose, and finally the classic Finn Balor Demon pose. Once I was satisfied with the results, I decided to edit the photos lightly and then post them onto my Instagram. I captioned it, "Maybe I'm part Demon too. @FinnBalor" and then tried Balor's entrance and wrestling moves in front of the mirror for about 15 minutes. I heard a couple notifications come from my phone but ignored them momentarily as I got in the shower to wash off all of the paint.

10 minutes later

I got out of the shower to hear my phone digging almost constantly. I quickly dried off and ran over to see the Demon King himself had liked and reposted my pictures. I squealed as I ran over to the couch to sit down as I was starting to feel light headed. Fangirls were liking and commenting both good and bad things, but I didn't care. FINN BALOR REPOSTED MY PICTURES!!! I always reading through the comments trying to decide if this was real when another notification popped up.

It was a message...from Finn Balor. My heart was pounding as I hovered my thumb over it and pressed the notification. "Maybe you could do my body paint someday. Your skills are very impressive. 😉"

My eyes bugged out of my head as I stared at the winky face. Was Finn Balor flirting with me?

"There's no way this is real. It was a typo or a fake account." I checked that it came directly from him and waited for him to correct himself saying it was supposed to be a smiley face, but nothing. I took a deep breath and responded, "Thank you so much Finn! Maybe someday... 😁" I don't know where that confidence came from, but I bit my lip waiting to see if he would respond again. About 2 minutes later, "I know your painting skills are awesome, but the other half of your face is breathtaking too. 😘" ANOTHER WINKING FACE! I dropped my phone, jumped up and down, and collected myself before I picked it back up and happily typed back, "Yours isn't too bad either. 😋" Finn and you exchanged numbers the next day after messaging all night.

A month later

Raw was in a city near you, so Finn got you VIP tickets and brought you backstage to meet some other superstars. He introduced you as his friend who posted those awesome face paint photos. You met Roman and Seth who were very nice and friendly before Finn took you to catering to meet Sasha and Bayley. When Finn talked about your photos, you saw Sasha give you a side smirk. "Well, you are very talented girl, it was great to meet you. If he does anything to hurt you, I'll come after him." You giggled nervously as Finn blushed and waved them off. Next, he took you to his locker room. Once inside, you sat on the bench as he sat next to you. "So how was the show?" "It was amazing to see you all live and in person. I had so much fun meeting the superstars too so thank you!" He smiled and scooted a bit closer to you. "Look Y/N, I know I'm constantly on the road, but I want to be closer to you." You tilted your head confusedly, "I'm 3 inches away from you Balor." He sighed and scratched the back of his neck before placing a hand on your knee. "I mean I want to be more than friends. I really like you Y/N. Your personality is a perfect fit for mine as you know when to make me laugh and when to turn on the sass. Whenever I'm texting you, everyone says I'm smiling and laughing like an idiot, but I don't care because it's you. Plus, you're absolutely gorgeous and I still can't believe someone like you is a fan of mine." You place your hand on top of his and lean in a bit whispering, "Is there a question at the end of this rambling?" He chuckles lowly and nods, "Y/N, will you be mine?" You smile and nod your head. "Of course I will." He leans in slowly and your lips connect with his in the sweetest kiss you've ever had.

Present day

Your boyfriend, Finn, is on the road and even though you miss him, you couldn't tell him in fear of seeming clingy. The past few days, he has been texting you less and even though you know he is super busy, you started to get worried about your relationship. He had come back to your hometown once for the weekend and you took a week off to travel with him, but most of your relationship was through FaceTime as expected. Your friends had noticed your mood becoming sadder, so they decided to invite themselves over for a girls' night at your place. You had tried to tell them about dating Finn before, but they just blew you off saying you were just pretending. In the middle of your movie marathon filled with popcorn and candy, you heard someone knock on your front door. It was 8pm, so you slowly made your way to the door before peeking through the peep hole to only see a blue eyeball staring back at you. You screamed and the figure jumped back allowing you to see that Finn was on the other side of the door. You screamed again as you swung the door open, this time from excitement instead of fear. "Baby, I'm back!" Finn dropped his bags and smiled as he wrapped you up in a big hug and spun you around. You hid your face in his neck until he put you back down on the ground. Both hands grabbed his face as you passionately kissed him only to be interrupted by the gasps behind you. You pulled apart to see your friends standing with their mouths hung open. Finn broke apart from you and stook his hand out for them to shake, "Hello, I'm Finn, Y/N's boyfriend. What are your names?" They shook his hand as words refused to come out of their mouths so you piped up, "These are my friends, ___ & ___." Finn smiled as he picked up his bags and made his way to your bedroom. You shut the door and stood with your arms crossed, waiting for them to finally talk. "We are so sorry girl. We really thought you were going crazy or something. I can't believe he's actually your boyfriend." You giggle, "I know it seems crazy, so you're forgiven as long as you pack up and leave. I need some alone time with my man." They laughed and ran to pick up their things. Finn came back out and saw them packing up. "I didn't mean to ruin your night girls, you can stay if you want." "No, we were just here to cheer up your girl, but I think you've got that covered now. It was nice meeting you though! We'll see you at work Y/N." You waved goodbye as Finn wrapped his arms around you from behind gently kissing your shoulder. "So babe, why were they cheering you up? And why didn't you tell me you were upset?" You turned in his arms and rested your forehead against his. "I was getting grumpy because I missed you. I didn't want to seem clingy by telling you how I much missed you, so I guess I was taking it out on them." He kissed your nose making you crinkle it up. "Babygirl, you should have heard how many times I complained to Seth about missing you. He threatened to curb stomp me if I didn't stop." I giggled at the thought and caught his lips in a slow kiss. I pulled back a bit, "So how did you get here?" "Kurt let me have a couple days off after Seth complained to him. Then I booked a flight, went to the airport, got on a plane, got in an uber, and walked up to your door." I looked down and shook my head as he told me every step of his journey and thought, "Wow, I love this dork." Finn lifted my chin up, "I love you too baby." He kissed me again and again until we found ourselves cuddled up on the couch watching our favorite movie.

A/N: Sorry for any grammar/spelling errors. I have not checked it yet, but I wanted to get it posted. 😀

Send in your requests!

[commander-yinello]

The Day before Christmas

Tis the season to be late with Christmas falalalalala~ This took a little longer than we anticipated. xD I got the massive honor to team up with the talented @cheebsrtd​ to create a fic with 5 gorgeous pieces of art! ♥‿♥ You will find them in between the story, to see them separately check out @cheebsrtd​ blog! This chatroom has juzen in it (duh) but also a whole bunch of other ships ;) All under the cut because this fic is really long. We hope you enjoy! Merry late Christmas and happy holidays <3333

10:04 - Yoosung★, ZEN, 707, Jaehee Kang, MC, Jumin Han, Saeran, Mary Vanderwood

Jumin Han: Hmm, V is late. Assistant Kang, you were certain he was on his way? Jaehee Kang: You asked me 5 minutes ago Mr. Han ;;; ZEN: Lay off jerkwad! (ಠ_ಠ) ZEN: Can’t believe you’re making her work on Christmas day -.- Jumin Han: That is why I pay her, Zen, you would understand if you weren’t so dramatic. Yoosung★: Aren’t we all working today actually? Mary Vanderwood: If a party can be called work. Yoosung★: It definitely can Jaehee Kang: Agreed... MC: Remember, it’s for a good cause ;;;; 707: Ah a bickering family, it’s truly like Christmas <3 Right Saeran? Saeran: I thought you said you wanted to stay at home buried under Honey Buddha Chips 707: Don’t reveal my secret after-party plans!

- V has entered the chatroom -

ZEN: See, there he is! V: Sorry for being late - had to figure out how to use our own RFA cloud storage V: As requested, I sent everyone a copy of all the pictures I made yesterday. ZEN: Opening my inbox as I type ~_^ V: Thanks for helping me sort them out. Jumin Han: Of course V, we know you’re just as busy as we are. Yoosung★: Wow there are a lot of pictures of the same thing V: Yes, I wanted to capture just the right moment. Jumin Han: Every moment would have been perfect if Elizabeth the 3rd had been there. ZEN: Urgh!!! Not the fleaball! Jumin Han: Elizabeth, get it right. MC: I hope we can find a few good ones to put on the site! Jaehee Kang: I would like to remind everyone the RFA has an image to uphold so nothing odd please. Looking at you Seven. (¬_¬) 707: What in the world do you meannnnnnnnnn Saeran: I’ll keep an eye on him, don’t worry Yoosung★: There are a lot of interesting ones! Yoosung★: I’m at the part where Vanderwood and Zen brought in the tree! ZEN: Man, that thing was heavy af. My beautiful nose nearly fell off from the cold while carrying it T_T Jaehee Kang: I’m still impressed you two managed to bring it in ZEN: Thanks Jaehee! No thanks to trust fund jerk Jumin Han: You never asked my help. ZEN: You could have offered! -.- Yoosung★: Oh, Vanderwood is in this picture! V: Haha, I asked him to pose because we have no photos of our newest member. Mary Vanderwood: Ah, that was embarrassing 707: Eyyyyyyy Mary looking good!~!~!*:･ﾟ✧ ✧ﾟ･: * Mary Vanderwood: Please stop ;;; Yoosung★: Oh right, this will be your first RFA party! Saeran: Don’t worry, you will never get used to the weirdness Mary Vanderwood: Didn’t expect to 707: WAIT HOLD THE PHONE MC: ?

707: ZOOM IN 707: ENHANCE Saeran: Can you not 707: BOOM

Jaehee Kang: Oh MC: OH Saeran: Huh V: Heh ZEN: SHIT Yoosung★: AH I THOUGHT I SAW THAT YESTERDAY Saeran: You did? Why didn’t you tell us? Yoosung★: I thought I was imagining it ;; 707: Awww you guys are so kyuuuuute~ (◕‿◕✿) ZEN: IT ISNT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE ASSHOLE Jaehee Kang: So this isn’t Mr. Han giving you a kiss on the nose? ZEN: HE ZEN: WAS JUST ZEN: ... Jumin Han: Zen was complaining about his face burning from the winter chill. Jumin Han: So I was helping him warm up. Mary Vanderwood: With your face? Jumin Han: Well Jumin Han: … ZEN: Oh FML Yoosung★: lol and no reply followed for 2 minutes Saeran: For an actor and a CEO, you both are terrible at lying Saeran: In a chatroom of all places 707: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) V: Come now Zen, we all pretty much knew about you two already. Yoosung★: We did? MC: You did? Jumin Han: V, how did you…? V: I know you two longer than today. ZEN: Seriously? Jaehee Kang: I suspected from the increasing office visits. One can only claim to work for a commercial so many times when there’s no contract on my desk. Jaehee Kang: I respect your privacy Zen, but you are going to need to work on subtlety. You have a public reputation to uphold. Saeran: Yeah I give them two weeks tops before all of Seoul knows MC: Aww have a bit more faith Saeran ;;; Mary Vanderwood: Tbh I’m not shocked. ZEN: What?! At least pretend to be!! Jumin Han: Hm. ZEN: Damn it Jumin, doesn’t it bother you a little bit?! ZEN: All this time acting like I hate you for nothing -.- Jumin Han: Isn’t this better Zen? Everyone is allowed to see that I love you. ZEN: Gah!! MC: Awww!! Jaehee Kang: Mr. Han, calm down!! Yoosung★: Ewww get a room ZEN: I’m blushing and that jerk knows it Jumin Han: (ᵔᴥᵔ) 707: Only blushing? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ZEN: Fuck off into the sun Saeyoung! Saeran: ...let’s go back to the photos 707: But this is fun!!! ZEN: Oh, is it now? ZEN: Because I’ve been scrolling ahead and I found something much more fun~ V: ?? MC: Uh oh MC: Zen, wait ZEN: See, it would be a crime to deprive the world of my beauty ZEN: But someone needs to be taught a lesson in humility Saeran: Is he talking about a selfie?

Jumin Han: Zen, I did not realize my actions would cause you to mess up a photo like this ZEN: No you weirdo, I cropped it on purpose (as much as it hurt to do so). Look at the side! Jaehee Kang: Wait, is that Saeyoung? Saeran: Pfffff Yoosung★: ?? wasn’t there a picture just now? 707: HA 707: NOTHING TO SEE HERE FOLKS 707: GOOD JOKE ZEN Saeran: You know there’s no point in deleting the photo right? Saeran: And I know you - don’t go hacking into everyone’s phone to erase every copy 707: Saeran nooooooooooooo why do you betray me like this T____T Saeran: I’m just being realistic V: You do realize I have back ups on the camera itself. Mary Vanderwood: Did… you get yourself entangled in lights? 707: DAMN IT MARY I CAN HEAR YOU LAUGHING 707: GO BACK TO YOUR MOP Yoosung★: Ahahaha OMG Saeyoung V: Saeyoung, MC, what happened? MC: Ah ;;;; MC: Well, somehow he got trapped and I cut him free 707: MC is my savior! <3 Jumin Han: You mean he wanted to prank someone, failed, and asked you to cut him down quick so no one would notice 707: That’s grossly wrong and mean of you to assume! Mary Vanderwood: Something tells me Jumin’s right. ZEN: Too bad for you I’m fantastic with the camera and picking up on your shit 707: Aaargh, go back to hating each other! 707: All versus one is not fair!! MC: Sorry Saeyoung, I wasn’t fast enough x.x Mary Vanderwood: Payback is an inappropriate 5-letter word Yoosung★: Get rekt bro 707: ;__; Yoosung★: Who was the prank for anyway? V: Whoever would fall for it I guess. Saeran: in other words, Yoosung Yoosung★: Me????? (!!˚☐˚) Saeran: Saeyoung, this wouldn’t have happened if I helped 707: Good point! Next one we can do together! Saeran: ^_^ ZEN: wait what next one Saeran: Just not Yoosung, he deserves a break Yoosung★: Saeran T_T <3 thank youuuuu ZEN: what next one???? Jaehee Kang: Can we please get back to the normal photos =.= Jumin Han: Yoosung, you do often fall for his obvious pranks Yoosung★: Oh come onnnnn Yoosung★: Lately I’ve been doing better Jumin Han: Lately Saeyoung’s been pranking you less Yoosung★: ;_; You guys are mean V: For what it’s worth, I believe you Yoosung Jaehee Kang: And really Saeyoung, you’re too old to keep doing this 707: Don’t tell me what to do mom! Jaehee Kang: M-mom?? Mary Vanderwood: Does that mean V is dad? Yoosung★: Wait, what??? (!!!!˚☐˚) Jaehee Kang: Excuse me?? ZEN: Vanderwood, what...

Mary Vanderwood: I’m talking about this. Yoosung★: Hey that’s me! Yoosung★: I remember this -.- Jaehee and V wouldn’t leave me alone because I spilled some mustard ZEN: Oh so that’s what Vanderwood meant ZEN: For a moment I thought he had gone mad ZEN: Wait. Did Vanderwood just make a joke? Mary Vanderwood: I do have a sense of humor, even if Saeyoung denies it. Saeran: Well you are kinda my brother’s mom sometimes Mary Vanderwood: Hey! Jaehee Kang: Am… Am I a mom? V: I was only trying to help. I’m sorry if that upset you, Yoosung. Yoosung★: To be honest, it didn’t upset me *that* much Yoosung★: I just don’t like the insinuation that I’m a kid >.< V: Of course not V: And Jaehee - you’re more a friend to all in the RFA. MC: V speaks the truth! You truly are the best Jaehee! <3 Jaehee Kang: Ah, that’s kinds of you V,  and MC, th-thank you (〃∀〃)ゞ 707: What are you all talking about? All I see is an adorable brother who got wrongfully cut off! <3 Saeran: … Saeyoung, stop… MC: So cute ZEN: No guesses who took the photo Jumin Han: V, please warn me if you plan to marry my assistant or future intern so I can plan ahead. Jaehee Kang: what V: what ZEN: OMG Jumin what. the. Hell. Yoosung★: WHAT?! Intenr!?? ZEN: Oi, typos Saeran: Really, that’s the thing that bothers you more? 707: BWAHAHAHA 707: I’m cackling Jumin out-trolled everyone Mary Vanderwood: And now things just got too weird Mary Vanderwood: I have regrets Jaehee Kang: You’ll never get used to it. ZEN: Jumin, I told you, your humor is too weird 707: Admit it Zen, you laughed 707: Jumin, did Zen laugh? ZEN: What makes you think I’m with him right now? Jumin Han: Why does everyone think I’m joking? Jumin Han: And he did ZEN: Jumin!!! V: Haha Jaehee Kang: Saeyoung, at this rate Zen is going to try to find more embarrassing photos of you to take revenge 707: Too bad, I’ve become immune now! 707: Bring on the embarrassing photos! Wanna see me in a virgin killing sweater? MC: OMG YES ♥‿♥ Yoosung★: Aaaah not here! Mary Vanderwood: See this is why no one takes you seriously. Saeran: Bro no please ಠ╭╮ಠ 707: ~(˘▾˘~) ZEN: Riiiiight, I’m going to ignore that and carry on Yoosung★: Also I don’t have time to be an intern, I’m studying to be a vet! Hmpf! 707: Study hard Yoosungie, you’ll escape Jumin’s clutches for sure!! Yoosung★: Thank you Saeyoung… I think Jumin Han: It’s an opportunity, not a requirement. ZEN: What Jumin means is that Yoosung can choose to take it, but he doesn't have to MC: This is the first time you’ve defended Jumin, Zen ZEN: It’s weird, I admit 707: Aaaand I’ve seen them all! Good job V and co~ V: Already? 707: I can easily multitask /╲/\╭( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡° )╮/\╱\ ZEN: V, it’s so hard to choose - I want all of them with my beautiful visage in it! Jumin Han: Same. Jaehee Kang: Mr. Han, we really need to have a meeting to discuss subtlety… Yoosung★: I’ve always been bad in multiple choice Mary Vanderwood: I’m not really sure how valuable my opinion is seeing I don’t know what image the RFA seeks to put up V: You used to be a professional bodyguard, right? I’m sure you know what feels right. Mary Vanderwood: Bodyguard? V: That’s what Saeran and Saeyoung told me? Mary Vanderwood: Oh, right. Yes. Yes, I used to be. Saeran: And now he’s a security guard. Jumin Han: That’s an odd response, Vanderwood. 707: Of course 707: he wasn’t a bodyguard 707: He was my maid (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ ✧ﾟ･: * lololololol Mary Vanderwood: The worst part is I can’t even deny it. Jaehee Kang: I can relate Yoosung★: Oh I accidentally made a photo as well Yoosung★: V, remember when you asked me to switch off your camera just before we all left to go home? V: Yes?

Yoosung★: I can’t believe Saeyoung missed this hehe Jaehee Kang: Vanderwood? Jumin Han: Saeran? 707: OMG Mary Vanderwood: What? It isn’t what it looks like! ZEN: Isn’t that literally what I said earlier? 707: WHY DIDNT YOU TELL ME YOU TWO WERE DATINGGGG Mary Vanderwood: ajkdjkhkjs we’re not!! MC: Then what were you doing? Mary Vanderwood: He was only wearing a skimpy jacket! If he were to walk out into the snowfall, he’d catch a horrible cold. Mary Vanderwood: So I gave him my scarf. V: I thought it was odd he had a leopard-printed scarf out of nowhere ZEN: That *is* rather romantic, Vandy Mary Vanderwood: It is? Jumin Han: Even I knew this. Saeran: I simply forgot my winter coat. But I liked it, it was warm Saeran: I’ll give it back to you at the party Vanderwood Mary Vanderwood: You… can keep it if you want. Saeran: Ah… thanks MC: This is so adorable I’m dying 707: Hehehe I know Mary’s blushing like crazy 707: You two have my blessing (◕‿◕✿) Yoosung★: And mine too! (⌒▽⌒) Mary Vanderwood: >.< The fact that I’m communicating here instead of real life because the twins are up to God knows what is bad enough Mary Vanderwood: I’m not Zen, stop prying into my private affairs. ZEN: Hey! But touché Jaehee Kang: This is a mess, we haven’t even selected our favorites yet. ZEN: If it wasn’t for Saeyoung, we would have - damn trickster! 707: The camera was the one who caught it all, someone else would have pointed it out anyway~! Jumin Han: Some people have the decency to do that discreet. Yoosung★: Well I don’t blame Saeyoung or the camera, you all are easily riled up Saeran: Yoosung, so are you! MC: Is it really that bad though? Who cares if we know of current and/or upcoming relationships MC: Let’s all focus now V: I’m sorry for causing such chaos, but I did find one picture that I thought was the best.

Jaehee Kang: Oh yes, the group picture! ♥‿♥ MC: Aaaah look at all of us! ZEN: Ah I’m radiant as always~ Mary Vanderwood: Posing twice for a photo in a day, what is this life Saeran: Welcome to the RFA. Yoosung★: We hope you will enjoy your stay! 707: And if you are in trouble you can call us night and day! ~_^ Jaehee Kang: Rhyming? V: Heh, they have impeccable timing. MC: Pfff you guys. This is definitely one to put on the site ZEN: Agreed! And if you think that was good, wait till you hear me sing! Yoosung★: How often have you sung for Jumin already? Jumin Han: Plenty. ZEN: Why are you so dreadfully honest?! Jaehee Kang: I give up. Saeran: Two weeks was too generous MC: Knowing you Saeran, you wouldn’t even hide two minutes Saeran: Of course not, I’ve wasted too much time to hide now Jumin Han: I’ll be off, time to get ready for tonight’s party. 707: Tonight will definitely be interesting Mary Vanderwood: Why does that worry me when you say that? V: ^_^ With you guys, it will be awesome. Jaehee Kang: Until tonight!

- V has left the chatroom - - Jaehee Kang has left the chatroom - - ZEN has left the chatroom - - Jumin Han has left the chatroom - - 707 has left the chatroom - - Yoosung★ has left the chatroom - - MC has left the chatroom -

Saeran: Wait, I wanted to say Saeran: … Saeran: Ah well, it doesn’t matter, we’ll see each other soon Saeran: ...Thank you all for your support <3 Saeran: Merry Christmas!

- Saeran has left the chatroom -

Mary Vanderwood: And if you don’t celebrate Christmas, happy holidays~

This conversation will be archived in the RFA records.

[leedaehwi]

I remember you mentioning about a Daehwi group chat and I wanted to ask, how will you describe each of your members?

Yeah! I formed a Daehwi GC a few months back with a few of my favorite Daehwi mutuals and I LOVE THEM ALL SO MUCH. In fact we’re talking right now! I love them all and am so happy that I got the chance to talk to them. They are a group of wonderful, lovely, amazing, people who always support me, and who always support Daehwi. I’ve met some of my closest online friends in this GC which says a lot to how close we are, ILY ALL!!! Anyways i’ll answer this now. We have 11 people in total ( 11 get it like w1) so there’s a lot but I still love them all. Actually when I describe them i’ll add something from their application for the gc ( I had people submit a form/ application thingy to decide who would be in the gc) since they’ve been asking me to show them the applications for a while anyways.

1. Me - the ultimate daehwi trash

2. Ashleigh @lee-daehwiis - A ballet queen. She is so gorgeous, talented, and hardworking. A soft who stans a lot of under rated groups and who just wants to spread love and happiness. Talking to Ashleigh always puts me in a good mood. Or whenever I see her snaps of her in her ballet stuff. I’m like wow Ashleigh is really out here making her dreams come true. She’s such an inspiration to me and I LOVE HER. Ashleigh said this in response to what she liked best about Daehwi in her form: “Is everything an acceptable answer? This is a difficult question! It’s hard to explain, but I feel like Daehwi has this quality that can just put everyone in a better mood. He can lighten up anyone’s day just by being around. He has a very positive attitude and pretends like nothing is wrong, even if something is. He went through so much and never complained. He inspires me in so many ways, and not just to be a better person.”

3. Amy @idaehwi - She’s such a talented GIF maker! She contributes so much quality content to the Daehwi tag and that alone makes me love her to the moon and back. She is also such a sweet pea, she’s been a bit busy recently, but we all have. When ever she does appear though she always screams about Daehwi and leaves us nice messages. When asked why she should be chosen to join the gc, Amy responded with: “bc i’m me :-)”

4. Charlie @wannaoneioi - MY FELLOW LOONA STAN. Charlie has a great taste in music and in memes. 10/10 always lights up the conversation. Even when the topics r a little weird hahahaha. Charlie introduced me to loona and dragged me down so lfjsafkajsfklj but thx charlie ;’) I love crying over girl groups. When asked what Daehwi’s best trait is, Charlie responded by saying: “screams in Daehwi” (in Charlie’s defense Daehwi does scream a lot kfljsaljk)

5. Colleen @furryowo - Colleen has to explain this at least once a day, but she is NOT actually a furry fjkdsalfjadklsf. Ok seriously tho, Colleen is probably one of the sweetest people in the gc. I first met her when I found out that she was my anon who kept leaving me sweet messages. Colleen is still as caring as when I first met her, and she always checks up on all of us and makes sure we’re ok. Colleen is kind of like the mom friend I guess. Colleen is also super smart and hardworking and I know she’s going to have a bright future. Colleen’s favorite hair color on Daehwi is Ash Grey, which is my favorite too! Surprisingly only Colleen picked Ash Grey as her favorite hair color, which further shows she is an intellectual.

6. Hana @wannabl - Hana has been super busy with school recently (me too big relate). She kinda reminds me of a younger me. Hana always stays up late cramming for tests and pushing herself to get into a great school. What I like about Hana is that she’s smart but still knows how to have fun ( LA parties seem wild). Hana is also really creative and funny and knows how to take a joke. We always tease her about her typos hahahahaha you really can’t understand what she’s saying. ILY HANA! Hana wanted to be added to the gc because, “GIRL DAEHWI MAKES MY OVARIES HURT”

7. Hatice @soweakpunchs - I am convinced Hatice is an angel. SHE IS SO NICE AND CARING AND SWEET AND ALWAYS LOOKING AFTER ME AND IM

8. Jenny @asianbro10 - JENNY THE LOVE OF MY LIFE. Jenny is one of my closest buds ever. She has helped me through so much, I am forever grateful. Another angel fkjdsaflksadfkl love her. Jenny even wrote us all some Daehwi fan fiction, it was a Harry Potter AU and it was stellar. Jenny is an amazing writer she writes so eloquently, so it was an amazing read. She would also always send us one shots which we died over. It was great. She also makes such amazing fan art. I am in awe of her tbh. She’s so hard working and puts in so much effort into school and everything she does. I have so much more to say about her, but I would probs end up writing an essay so i’m gonna end it with an “ILY JENNY”. What Jenny likes most about Daehwi is “Everything. Every. Thing. His irreplaceable talent, adorable aegyo (I’m trash), charming personality and he cuTe as heLL.”

9. Jini @daisydaehwi - Such a precious cinnamon roll that deserves so much better. She’s so nice and sweet and I wish things start looking up for her in 2018. Jini always has the best memes. Tbh whenever Jini sends memes, I save them and steal them because they’re great (sorry Jini) Jini has such a loving personality and JIULEEN IS REAL AND I SHIP IT. Jini also chose light brown as her favorite hair color on Daehwi.

10. Maria @dearestguanlin - Maria has been busy and hasn’t been too active hahaha but whenever she shows up we’re like wow it must be a Christmas miracle. I’ve known Maria wayyyyyy before the Daehwi gc, she was one of the people I became really close to when I first joined Tumblr. She has been nothing but supportive of me. Maria has put up with my screaming in caps lock for months, which is an impressive achievement. Maria is like my intellectual bestie. We always rant about school, and education in our countries and suffer together. Maria is very smart, and sweet, and creative AND I LOVE HER SOSOSOSOSOSOSOSO MUCH. Maria wanted to join the gc because “Im your mutual? Jk i love Daehwi and would like to scream about him Ex. OMG LEE DAEHWI LOOKS SO GOOD IN PINK”

11. Pingdi @dae-hwee - Pingdi our resident intellectual (she goes to an ivy league y’all!) If Colleen is like the mom, Pingdi is like the cool aunt. She’s very straight up but still very loving towards everyone. Pingdi is not only smart but an amazing dancer too! She’s shown us her covers and i’m always shook fklasdjf. Pingdi is probably one of the most determined people in the gc. She pushes herself to the limit and does her best. Pingdi is also an amazing GIF maker and always makes such smooth gifs. ILY TOO PINGDI~ What Pingdi likes best about Daehwi is “Yo his English cover that he submitted for Produce 101. He’s got those Sunday morning voice vibes and I love it.”

fljkdsajfasfkjlasdk sorry for the typos, this is really long and I didn’t feel like making sure it was grammatically correct rip but in conclusion, I LOVE MY DAEHWI GC THEY ARE ALL AMAZING PEOPLE AND I’M GLAD TO HAVE MET THEM

[eloarei]

All Night

Read here on AO3. words: 931 fandom: Boku no Hero Academia characters/ pairings: Izuku/All Might, Izuku/Bakugo, Class 1-A & Izuku (about half of 1-A is present) tags: chatlog, texting, dialogue-only, mild crack, teasing notes: I’ve never written a chatlog type fic before, but I woke up and suddenly it was there.  Izuku just wanted to talk about the homework. xXx Deku: Did either of you finish the homework we got from All Night? Deku: It was kind of hard. ~No Gravity~: Pfft Deku-kun, was that a Freudian slip? Deku: what? Deku: omg uraraka-san no IngeniumX: Uraraka-san, you know Freud's theories have been disproven, right? Deku: it was ust a typo

IngeniumX: Although that doesn't necessarily diminish the implication. ~No Gravity~: hee! Deku: it was Autocorrect! ~No Gravity~: aww it's okay Deku-kun ~No Gravity~: i mean it's All Right. for you to like All Might Deku: uraraka-san please xBakusatsujinx: hahaha IngeniumX: Midoriya-kun, Uraraka-san is just teasing you. Deku: what? why is Kacchan here? IngeniumX: But I'm positive your friends and classmates will be fully supportive of you if that is the case. ~No Gravity~: Oh I added him when I made the group. xBakusatsujinx: Ochaco you hit the nail on the head with this one. Nerd's been obsessed since forever. ~No Gravity~: awww Deku: Kacchan come on xBakusatsujinx: when we were kids sometimes he wanted us to play pretend ~No Gravity~: so cute Deku: omg Kacchan dont xBakusatsujinx: and I'd be All Might xBakusatsujinx: ... xBakusatsujinx: yknow actually i'll just let you imagine the rest ~No Gravity~: aww Densetsu Denki: hey don't leave us hanging _Earphone_Jakku_: You can't do that, Bakugo. Finish your story. Yaoyorozu Momo: The two of you must have gotten along better back then. Alien+Queen: you kissed, didn't you? =3 Deku: how many people did you add to this chat??! Rockman: did you play house and have a bunch of kids GrapesOfWrath: that is Disgusting! Ashido I can't believe you made me imagine that with my own brain ~No Gravity~: most of 1-A. ^^; Sorry! Froppy: Mineta-chan, quit it. _Earphone_Jakku_: /You're/ disgusting, Mineta. Deku: [this kills the man.png] xBakusatsujinx: he's definitely got a thing for All Might though ~No Gravity~: i'm sorry, Deku-kun! ^^; _Earphone_Jakku_: Yeah but who /doesn't/ though? Rockman: bakugo are you just trying to get us to stop thinking about you kissing midoriya? GrapesOfWrath: I DON'T ~No Gravity~: I never meant for this to turn into an... All Fight ~No Gravity~: XD; Yaoyorozu Momo: Nobody ask your opinion, Mineta. Alien+Queen: oh my gosh Ochaco yes GrapesOfWrath: JIRO SAID WHO DOESN'T HAVE A CRUSH ON ALL MIGHT AND I SAID I DONT Densetsu Denki: woah Jiro-chan do you have a crush on all might too? ~No Gravity~: hehe but its quite the All Sight, isn't it? Rockman: capslock abuse, ban him Alien+Queen: it's definitely an impressive chat log! Good thing we're All Tight, or this might turn into no bark and All Bite. =P _Earphone_Jakku_: I mean it's not like a crush really. It's just, he's the world's greatest hero. ~No Gravity~: Ashido, nice! _Earphone_Jakku_: It's not like it's weird if Midoriya does like him. Kinda makes sense. Alien+Queen: thanks! =D I love a good pun. Densetsu Denki: yeah I get that _Earphone_Jakku_: He's a celebrity. Deku: I just wanted to know if anyone finished the homework. T_T GrapesOfWrath: you guys are crazy! Why would anybody like all might? If he was a girl maybe. Froppy: Midoriya-chan's not dead after all. :] Densetsu Denki: you don't have to be shy about it, Midoriya. Alien+Queen: /I'd/ like All Might if he was a girl. wow can you imagine? Rockman: haha mineta but his tits are already bigger than most of the girls in class Densetsu Denki: it's okay if you like All Might, jiro said so. Rockman: maybe you need to change your priorities. GrapesOfWrath: man tits are not the same as girl tits! AT ALL. youre heathens! _Earphone_Jakku_: Yeah, sure. I'll back you up, Midoriya. ~No Gravity~: aww see deku-kun, people don't mind <3 Froppy: Midoriya-chan, I'm on your side. IngeniumX: You should all stop teasing Midoriya-kun. After all, you can't help how you feel sometimes. GrapesOfWrath: I'm leaving, you guys are gross. _Earphone_Jakku_: I'm not teasing. Yaoyorozu Momo: Yes, Iida-kun is right. Midoriya-kun, was there a particular part of the homework you had trouble with? I can PM you about it if you like. Rockman: I bet mineta's having a crisis, thinking about how big All Might's boobs are xBakusatsujinx: I can't believe you're all siding with the nerd. It's npt cute it's annoying. ~No Gravity~: lol yeah, pretty sure they're bigger than mine XD; Densetsu Denki: hey don;t be jealous just becayse Midoriya would rather kiss the hot teacher these days haha IngeniumX: Kaminari-kun, I'm not sure that's entirely appropriate to talk about. Alien+Queen: ooh boy that's an image! IngeniumX: Even if it is true. ~No Gravity~: oh my gosh XDXDXD; Froppy: wow Rockman: haha mineta would be puking right now _Earphone_Jakku_: Lol is it getting a little hot in here? Yaoyorozu Momo: Well. I have to go now. Good night! Deku: [this is fine.gif] ALL MIGHT: Shouldn't you all be heading to bed by now? Densetsu Denki: !! Alien+Queen: omg was he here the whole time?! Froppy: oops XD; Rockman: oh haha hey sensei _Earphone_Jakku_: uh yeah I've gotta go ALL MIGHT: Midoriya, if you need extra help with the homework, you can see me privately after class. ~No Gravity~: ʘ‿ʘ Froppy: wowow _Earphone_Jakku_: Holy shit I'm dying! Densetsu Denki: please don't let us all get detention Rockman: did he even read the rest of the convo? Did he read what he just wrote?? Alien+Queen: THIS IS THE WORST!!! <3 <3 Deku: Okay. Thanks. ^^; _Earphone_Jakku_: he's not even paying attention Alien+Queen: I CAN'T WITH THIS ALL MIGHT: (o^-')b Froppy: cute~ GrapesOfWrath: OH MY GOD I AM CALLING THE COPS ON EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU!

[cardcaptorcoconut]

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card Arc Chapter 11 Translation

I went to the bookstore at lunch today and was happy to find that Nakayoshi is out a day early. Here is the full version of the chapter 11 translation.  Going through it a second/third time, I noticed some errors I made in the preview versions and have corrected them (just nuances and typos; nothing plot significant). Sorry about the changes!

Also, I bought some extra goods yesterday at Sakura Fest and will be updating my CCS goods sale post soon.  If you’re interested in an item, please PM me. Right now things are quite busy for me at work, but I will try to respond as quickly as I can. :)

☆★Translation Notes Reminder★☆

Disclaimer: These are just fan translations. Please support the official release.

Chapter 11

Splash Page with Anime Preview Art: “I believed that we would meet again!”

Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card Arc Volume 3 on sale Wednesday, September 13th.  The special edition version of Volume 3 will include an OVA animation DVD with the story “Sakura & the Two Bears” - sold together with volume 3, pre-order start!!

[Note: This story will be an anime adaptation of both Syaoran’s original confession from the manga, and Sakura’s confession to him before he leaves for Hong Kong]

Deadline for applying: Friday, July 14th, 2017   On sale date Wednesday, September 13th Price: 3,480 Yen

Cover Page:

“Could you be friends with me?”

P1 Yue:  Another new card…? Sakura:  Yeah… At Tomoyo-chan’s house. Yue:  What kind of card is it? Sakura:  This is it. Kero:  "Record"… Yue:  You don’t have to get close to the screen.  I should just look at what our mistress has in her hand. Kero:  True, but there’s such a thing as having a presence, you know. Yue:  What can it do?

P2 Sakura:  I haven’t tried it out yet.  But I think it can record things somehow. Kero:  Try it out right now! Sakura:  Okay!  "Record!“ <Sakura activates the card>

P3 Kero:  It’s not moving, right? Sakura:  Y-yeah. Kero:  I guess it won’t work unless you give it a proper command? Sakura:  Take a recording around me now! Kero:  This (card)… did it record? Sakura:  How are we supposed to watch (what it recorded)?

P4 Sakura:  Project what you’ve recorded! Kero:  Ooooh! Sakura:  It’s like I’m really standing right here! Kero:  I see.  So this is how it’s used! Kero:  Record Yue next time too. Yue:  No thanks.

P5 Yue:  Well for now, it looks as though you’re unharmed. Kero:  That’s right. Sakura:  But this might be useful.  I can use this whenever there’s something I want to save. Sakura:  I’d just been thinking how it would be nice if I could do that… Sakura:  Ah! Sakura:  I need to leave about now!  I’ll talk to you later, Yue-san! Yue:  Be careful on your way. Sakura:  I will!

P6 Sakura:  I’m heading out! <Kero dives into Sakura’s bag.  A moment later, Sakura sees Akiho> Sakura:  Akiho-chan! Akiho:  Good morning. Sakura:  Good morning.  Good morning to you too, Momo-chan!

P7 Akiho:  Good morning to your friend too. <Sakura pulls Kero out of the bag. Caption reads: “Pretending to be a stuffed animal”> Sakura:  Yeah! Sakura:  Kero-chan came along with me! Akiho:  Good morning, Kero-san. Kero:  <thinking> Strangled! I’m being strangled!! <Sakura shoves him back into her bag> Sakura:  That reminds me, whereabouts do you live Akiho-chan?

[Lit: …where is your house?]

P8 Akiho:  It’s (a bit of) an isolated house that’s a close enough distance to walk to.  I heard that a boy from England who was about my age used to live there before. Sakura:  Eh!? Sakura:  Do you happen to have a picture of your house? Akiho:  Y-yes.

P9 Sakura:  It’s Eriol-kun’s house! Akiho:  Eh!? <Later at school> Kero:  I was strangled… At that rate, I thought I was gunna (die).

[Note: The Japanese was あのまま落ちるかと思たで – The word kero uses is 落ちる which has several meanings (e.g. “to fall”, “to drop”, “to fail”, “to give up”, “to die”). I thought of these he was probably being extra dramatic, but he could have just meant that he was about to drop the stuffed animal façade.]

Sakura:  I-I’m sorry. Kero:  Next time be more careful about how you treat me. Kero:  So, about this morning’s conversation… Sakura:  That’s right. It’s about Akiho-chan’s house. Syaoran:  So it was Hiiragizawa’s house...

P10 Sakura:  I was surprised.  But Akiho-chan was surprised too when I said it was where our friend used to live. <Text around Eriol says “Former Home Owner”> Sakura:  And so, she invited us over to visit this Sunday. Syaoran:  To Shinomoto’s house? Sakura:  Akiho-chan has been to many countries and she said she’d show us the books she’s collected from (her travels).

[Lit: …she said she’d show us the books she’s collected from those times.]

Sakura:  I’m sure I won’t be able to read foreign books, but she said she has books with lovely pictures and photos. Syaoran:  I’m sorry.  I have something to do on Sunday… Sakura:  I see… That’s a shame.  Well, Tomoyo-chan and I will go then. Syaoran:  Can you apologize to Shinomoto for me? Sakura:  Sure! Sakura:  U-um so…  Are you free the next Sunday?

P11 Sakura: U-um, I’m working really hard on the tamagoyaki [Lit: rolled egg]. It’s warm out and if the weather’s nice, um, we can go out together… Syaoran: If you’re okay going with me. Sakura: Th-that goes for me too. If you’re okay going with me! Kero:  Hey, I’m here too!  It’s not just your own world, you two!

P12 Kero:  Tomoyo, why do you have to have classroom duty today? (I’m the third wheel…)

[Lit: “I’m lonely…” but it’s basically what he means]

<Later, Sakura and Tomoyo go to Eriol’s/Akiho’s house> Sakura:  So it really is Eriol-kun’s house. Tomoyo:  It looks that way. <Sakura rings the bell> Akiho:  Yes?

P13 Sakura:  U-um, it’s Kinomoto. Tomoyo:  (And) Daidouji. Akiho:  I’ll open it now. Sakura:  Wow! Akiho:  Please come in. Sakura:  Y-yes! Kero:  You’re moving really suspiciously. Tomoyo:  Thank you for inviting us. Sakura:  …(f-for inviting us). Akiho:  I’m so happy that you came!

P14 Yuna:  Hello. Yuna:  Thank you for coming all this way today. Akiho:  Ever since I was little, I’ve always caused Kaito-san a lot of trouble. Yuna:  I am Yuna D. Kaito.  I watch over Akiho-san.  It’s very nice to meet you.

[Note:  Yuna speaks very politely and uses honorifics much like Tomoyo does.]

P15 Yuna: And you haven’t caused me trouble even once, Akiho-san. Yuna:  Please come inside. Sakura:  Wow!

P16 Sakura:  It’s really different from when Eriol-kun lived here. Tomoyo:  That’s true. Sakura:  What a cute room. <Yuna brings tea into the room> Akiho:  That’s a nice aroma. Yuna:  I prepared the cherry blossom flavored tea souvenir you gave us. Akiho:  <to Sakura and Tomoyo> Thank you very much. Sakura:  Tomoyo-chan and I picked it put. Yuna:  Here you are.

P17 Sakura, Tomoyo, & Akiho:  Thank you so much! Sakura & Akiho:  It’s delicious! Yuna:  Thank you very much. Please have some of this too. Sakura, Tomoyo, & Akiho:  I’ll have some! Sakura:  Hanya~n! <Sakura is suddenly embarrassed>

P18 Sakura:  I-it’s nothing! Tomoyo:  What’s the matter? Sakura:  I accidentally said “Hanya~n” Tomoyo:  But it’s so cute… Sakura:  I’m a middle school student now and it’s a little embarrassing, so I’m trying not to say it as much as I can. Sakura:  It’s very delicious! Tomoyo:  Which cake shop is this from? Yuna:  It’s from here. Tomoyo:  Oh wow, this is homemade?

P19 Akiho:  He always makes homemade sweets, meals, and bentos for me. Sakura:  That’s amazing! Yuna:  Not at all. Yuna:  It’s because this is my job. Sakura:  Akiho-chan…

P20 Akiho:  After we finish the cake, there’s a place I definitely want to show you. <Akiho takes Sakura & Tomoyo to her library> Sakura:  Wow!!

P21 Sakura:  Are these all your books? Akiho:  Rather than belonging to me, these were collected by my relatives. Tomoyo:  Your family must be avid readers. Akiho:  Yes, they all love books.  They collect them whenever they travel around various countries.  This is just a small part (of the collection). Sakura:  Hoeee, this is… Akiho:  I love books too… There’s a book I want at any cost that I came to Japan to get. Sakura:  (You came to Japan) for a book?

P22 Akiho:  For that, and also… <Sakura feels a presence> Sakura:  <thinking> Huh…? Akiho:  What’s the matter? Tomoyo: ……

P23 Sakura:  I-it’s nothing. Sakura:  Ah!  Akiho-chan, you said you have a favorite book, didn’t you? Akiho:  Yes. Sakura:  I was just thinking I’d love to see it if that’s okay with you. Akiho:  Of course! Akiho:  It’s in my room, so I’ll go and get it.

P24 Tomoyo:  Could it be that…? Sakura:  Yeah… It might be a card. Tomoyo:  Did something happen? Sakura:  No, (I only felt) a presence.  It seemed like it was over here. Sakura:  Huh? Sakura:  This is the only place that doesn’t have books? Tomoyo:  You’re right.

P25 Tomoyo:  Volumes 1 through 9 are all here.  Then there’s a gap (until) Volume 18 onwards. Sakura:  I wonder if someone is reading them. Sakura:  Eh!? Tomoyo:  What happened? Sakura:  This…! Narration:  The books that mysterious disappeared.  Just what does this mean?  The highly praised Volume 2 is now on sale ☆

[aileen-hollingsworth]

Ties, Baguettes & Titanics ~ #3

A/N: First challenge. Ngl this turned out long, like real long. Thanks to @prince-consort-erik for role playing Haiden. Forgive typos and stuff like that, I had little to no time to edit. There are small mentions of @sophiemoreaux, @baguette-le-chef, @alexandra-amaria, @mila-regan , a guard and fictional actors.

“No, there’s no real point to being nervous.” Sophie shrugged. “I’m just going to wait and see what happens, it isn’t that big a deal.”

I could see many of the girls nearby gave her glances full of disbelief. The how-is-she-not-nervous-about-dating-a-prince look…okay, that’s not a thing but you get the point.

I just nodded at her and eyed the other girls. I was still a bit uncertain of most of them so I didn’t really tell her (or anyone else) if I was nervous or not. I was a bit too used to keeping my opinion to myself when in a new public place, so with so many Selected in the Women’s room I had some issues talking much. If it was a ‘one on one’ conversation I had no problem—like when I’d bumped into Naomi in the library while looking for pretty editions to take photos of, or when I’d gone looking for chips in the kitchen with Mila in the middle of Viola’s sleepover—but when it was conversations with people in earshot I was too self-aware.  

When my maids asked me in my room if I was nervous I just shrugged and Anne, the oldest, frowned. “What is that supposed to mean?”

I didn’t take my eyes of my polaroid photos scattered across the floor when I answered. The palace definitely had some aesthetically pleasing books. “I don’t know. I guess I’m giddy because he’s a prince and all, but I’ve talked to well-known celebrities because of my parents before.” I picked the photos that captured the lighting better and offered them to Janet to inspect.

I’d heard the whispers around the Selected. Everyone seemed to think Haiden was shy. I didn’t want things to be awkward; I was just hoping to have a good time. “I’m trying to tell myself there isn’t that big a difference between him and, I don’t know…” I shrugged again. “Ezra Lynley.”

Janet who had been admiring the photos immediately glanced down at me. “You know Ezra Lynley?”

A Two. Star of a gazillion movies. Nice cheekbones. Most importantly, a great guy and one of my cousin’s closest friends.

I nodded at Janet, trying not to make it seem like a big deal. She shared a surprised glance with Anne. During late-night conversations I’d told them my father was a movie producer, but maybe they didn’t expect a Three to know someone as popular…which kind of made sense. My father was popular mostly between the media and the world that knew his work. Being a movie producer wasn’t “important” in comparison to being an actor or artist. Of course, actors wouldn’t get any work if it weren’t for movie producers (same way some artists wouldn’t be as good without music producers). People working on the media would recognize my father’s name immediately, but it wasn’t as common for all civilians to know who he was.

Janet sat down next to me, avoiding the polaroid photos surrounding me with a smirk. “Is he as hot in person?”

Anne scowled and I chucked.

He tripped over me. He actually tripped over me. That’s how it started.

“What the—” I grunted as something hit my legs.

As I sat up to look at the person who’d fallen next to me he said: “Lady Aileen! What… are you doing?”

Oh boy. He was lying on the grass with a confused frown. “Prince… Haiden? Oh wow, I’m so sorry….I didn’t mean to make you, um, trip.” I mumbled taking my headphones off. The rest of the piano’s melody still vaguely stuck on my head without them.

He gave me an awkward grin and adjusted his glasses. “N-No, it’s all right. What are you doing anyway?”

What was I doing here? I blinked without saying anything, and then snapped back into focus. “Oh, you know getting some fresh air before our— ”  My eyes widened as I tried to figure out how long I’d been here in the gardens. “Oh wait, what time is it? Tell me I didn’t forget about our date…”

“Date?” he mumbled still confused, but then something seemed to click into place in his thoughts. “Is it really?”

I raised an eyebrow, smirking. “You forgot about it?”

He laughed awkwardly, and my smirk widened. “Well, so did you apparently.”

“Well, I kind of lost track of time so it’s different.” I chuckled.

“I would’ve remembered eventually.” He countered. Then looking down at my headphones and sitting up he added: “Uh, what are you listening to?”

“Just some music samples.” I turned up the volume and pressed one side of the headphones to his ear. “Piano can make such a beautiful sound.”

“They sound nice. You like music then?”

“Yeah. If being a princess doesn’t work I gotta make a life out of it.” I said winking.

“What instruments do you play?”

“Oh, I’m not precisely one with many instruments. Just piano, guitar and basic ukulele…but music producers don’t usually need to know how to play an instrument, you know. Knowing how to play some—like I do—is kind of a plus.”

“Oh, so you’re a producer. What’s that like?”

“Umm, I don’t think I can qualify as a professional producer just yet, but I will get there hopefully. It’s mostly getting to choose what tracks sound well together…like for example figuring out what’s the best moment in a song to let violins join the drums and the piano.”

“That sounds crazy. I could never do something like that.”

I waved a hand dismissively. “Of course you could. You just need to learn how to listen to the music.” You need to actually pay attention to how it sounds. Feel it to your core.

“Trust me that talent is far away from mine.”

“And what may that talent be?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Breathing.”

Very funny. “Oh wow, that does sound very complicated. Got any tips on that?”

“Well, it gets harder when you run, so you have to do it more.”

I pretended to nod thoughtfully. “True, true. What happens when you’re under water though?” I said trying to keep the ridiculous game on. He didn’t seem so nervous.

“You can try to breathe, but usually it doesn’t work, so I’d advise against it.”

“Gonna keep that in mind if I ever find myself under those circumstances.” I smiled, rolling my eyes amused.  “Any other talents you’d like to share?”

“Eating, for one. But I also do incredibly well at sleeping.”

“You are such a talented prince it’s actually shocking.” I said, trying to sound serious.

“I know, the country should be so pleased.”

“Yeah, you should already be King to be honest. I mean, I’m good at eating and breathing, but sleeping is rather hard to handle.”

“Oh, most definitely.” He finally couldn’t keep it up and laughed. “How did we get on this topic again?”

I laughed too. “I don’t know, I’m just trying to break the ice here, I’d say I’m doing pretty well in a very strange way.” Strangest way possible.

“I’d say so for two people who forgot their own dates and ended up in the palace garden after I tripped over you.”

“Yeah,” I looked up at the sky confused picturing his fall. I’d been with my eyes closed and missed the incident. “How did you not notice me on the ground? I had my headphones on, what’s your excuse?”

“I’m wearing glasses. And I don’t usually expect for girls to be lying down in the middle of a garden.”

I brought a hand to my chest pretending to be offended. “Why not, it’s a perfectly normal thing to do.”

“Apparently. I must be so unsocialized.”

He makes up words. Nice. “Obviously,” I said reaching for his glasses and placing them on my nose “it’s practically etiquette for ladies to do it at least once a week.”

“I can’t see now.” He said, slightly squinting in my direction.

The fact that he didn’t seem bothered by my lack of consideration for his personal space was a good sign. It meant he was relaxed. I continued, squinting through his glasses. “You got some heavy lenses I see…at least you look cute with them.”

I was pleased to hear him laugh at that. “I usually wear contacts.”

“Makes sense, I usually never see you wearing these” I replied, making the glasses move up and down on my nose. “I thought it was a fashion statement or something.”

“Nope, I’m just blind as a bat.”

I placed the glasses on the top of my head like a headband to see him properly. “Bats have great hearing though.” I kept talking as I waved a hand in front of his eyes in an attempt to tests his sight. I was hoping to be annoying actually. I myself used glasses, but just to read. “Maybe being a music producer wouldn’t be as hard as you think.” I raised three fingers. “How many fingers am I holding?” He gave me a serious glance, but I could see the corner of his lip twitch. “Quick Haiden, you’re life depends on your answer!”

“It’s three, I’m not that blind.”

“WRONG IT’S THREE.” I corrected him.

This time his face broke into a confused smile. “Is there a difference I’m not getting?

“The accent of course.”

“Accent? Well, I didn’t know that was a factor.”

“…Well I had to correct you in some way so now it’s a factor. You have to say it like you’re about to drink tea with the Queen of England.” I explained, raising a pinky as I zipped tea from an invisible teacup.

“I didn’t realize. I only know how to have tea with two queens.”

I’d forgotten about his aunt, Queen Sabine of France, for second so he had to clarify, but then he laughed and started talking in a British accent as his face faked smugness. “I come from a long line of blue bloods.”

I tried to do my own impression. “Is that so? Well, so do I, your Highness.”

“That is an awful accent, I can’t lie.” He cooed amused.

I shoved him. “Shut up you fancy pants, I do a great accent.”

“Wow, assaulting the prince tsk tsk.”

I bit my lip and narrowed my eyes at him but quickly recovered with a: “Tripping over a lady tsk tsk.”

“Stealing my glasses tsk tsk.”

“Insulting my accent tsk tsk,” I am running out of tsk-tsks “which is very good by the way.”

“Nay.”

“Whatever,” I said, dramatically flipping my hair. “I know my own talent.”

“Well then. I’m offended.”

“Because of my superiority?” I winked.

“Obviously.”

“Don’t feel intimidated by my talents Haiden, I am a very normal girl…” I paused, realizing that wasn’t entirely true. “Most of the time.”

“What’s the rest of the time?”

“Well, wouldn’t you like to know?” I said, tauntingly.

“In fact, I would very much.”

I smiled looking up at the clouds in the sky. One actually looked like a scrunched man’s face yelling. “It really depends.”

“Ask me a question, Lady Aileen.”

I looked over at him, curious about his choice of words to carry on with the conversation, but then looked back at the yelling-man cloud. What did I want him to tell me? “It’s not a question but tell me about something you love.”

It didn’t take him long to pick something. “I love my sisters.”

I knot formed on my throat at the words, but I still smiled at his choice. “I bet they love you too.”

“Hopefully.”

I laughed. “Hopefully?”

“I always wonder.”

I shook my head with a faint smile. “That’s some trust you’ve got in them… why the doubt though?”

“I don’t know. They’ve never said they didn’t love me, but it’s something I always naturally wonder.”

Sam’s face popped up in my head but I pushed it away. “Haven’t they ever told you they do?”

“Of course they have, but… I don’t know. Sometimes I wonder if they’d rather have someone else as a brother.”

I sighed. I never do even though I should. “If you love them as much as you say I doubt they’d want anyone else, I can tell you that.”

He shrugged and I desperately wanted to stop Sam’s words from flooding my thoughts so I smirked and suggested: “Well, since it seems I won’t convince you about that, how about we officially start our date? Believe it or not, I actually had something planned…unless you’ve got any other ideas.”

“I don’t know, I’m rather comfortable on the ground.” He admitted, padding the grass as if to emphasize his statement.

I rested my elbows on the grass, keeping the upper half of my body upward. “Am I not boring you with trivial conversation?”

“I don’t know, it always seems like things unplanned go better.”

“Suggestions then?” I actually wanted to give my plan a try for once, so when I noticed his hesitation I wiggled my eyebrows and inquired: “Or maybe you’d like to go on a treasure hunt…or is it scavenger hunt? Either way you get the idea.”

That spiked his interest. “Ooh, how would we do that?”

“Well, it’s simple. I make a list of things we need to find. We look for them together. There’s a catch to it though.”

“Oh?”

“I gotta make it interesting somehow.” I said grinning. “First rule is we can’t ask for permission to take the object.”

“I can work with that.”

No hesitation. Good. I nodded in approval. “Second rule: Every time we find an object we have to make a guess about each another.”

That confused him. “A guess?”

“Like for example…I think your favorite color is green. I don’t know if it is, I’m just guessing.” After the mention of his favorite green tie on our interview I was hoping to get that right.

“Seems easy enough. And it’s blue by the way.”

“Dang it I thought I had it right.” I mumbled, mostly to myself. That meant the green tie being his favorite probably had a backstory then. “Anyway, that’s how it works.”

“Alright, then.” He stood up offering me a hand. “Where to first?”

“We need an autographed book.” I said accepting the help. “Also, I forgot to mention, if you guess correctly you get a compliment or a truth.”

“Oh, well, now I’m very entertained.” He stated and actually seemed on board with the idea. “An autographed book, huh? I have at least 10 in my room. Come on, let’s go.”

The door of his room stood in front of us and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious about how it looked inside.

“Um, could I ask you something?” He pondered.

“Sure. I’m all ears.”

“Can you… not tell anyone you were here? I don’t want people getting jealous or the wrong idea…”

“Are you kidding me?” I began with a smirk. “I’m not telling anyone, that’ll get us both killed. Plus we don’t need ‘Exposing Illea’ to go around saying lies.”

He laughed at this. “All right.” He didn’t hesitate again when he opened the door and pulled me in. “Um, pardon the mess.” He immediately went to a book shelved corner and started looking at a particular section.

I slowly walked over to him taking a look around. There was the bed, the bookshelfs in the corner, what seemed like an entrance to a closet, then another door (most likely the bathroom) and also a desk filled with papers and more than one kind of writing tool. He even had ink and a…feathery pen thing.

I was in the middle of saying it wasn’t that bad when I reached him and had to stop to stare in awe at his bookshelf. I’d seen incredible books with different editions on the palace’s library but these were another level. “Oh my God…” I practically whispered as I reached for the book with the oldest looking cover. I stared at every detail. The engraving on the front, the golden ink of the title, the pages tinted with age. “Why did I not bring my camera, these hardcovers are gorgeous.”

“1st Editions. One of the perks of being famous.”

I couldn’t contain my smile as I held up the book for him to see. “You can practically smell the ancient.”

“Why don’t you keep it?”

I had to do a double take of his words in my mind before smiling again. “And here I was about to call you greedy for hoarding all the prettiest books from the library.”

“Got to make sure no one takes it.” He smiled, and then took the book from my hands to flip it open. “And look, signed by the author.”

I peeked over his shoulder to look at the signature. “Well, would you look at that…” I ventured, tracing the dark ink with my fingers. “Pretty.”

He glanced down at me, still smiling, and I decided I liked his smile. “What’s next?”

I told my mind to ignore the closeness between us. “Since we’re already in your room I’d say a green tie. I already know you’ve got one.” I pressed, in remembrance of my interview.

“What are you planning to do with it?”

“It’s part of the list, just trust me.” I shrugged.

Too my surprise he accepted that as a good enough reason and went into his closet. He came out with a green tie on a hanger. My dad usually just had his stashed together.

“Fancy.” I teased.

“Why, thank you. What next? Do I get a compliment yet?”

I laughed. “Not yet. First the guessing, hopefully I’ll get this one right…” I looked him up and down tapping my chin thoughtfully, trying to come with something good. “Okay, I think you’re that person that starts flirting a lot when drunk.”

“I-I… don’t know.”

Stuttering again. “Hmm, that’s not fair, I want a compliment.”

“Fine, maybe you’re right, I’ll give you a compliment anyway.”

I smiled victoriously and waited.

“I like your freckles.”

I raised both eyebrows for a second. “Oh, wow thanks! Sometimes I forget I have them if that makes any sense” I laughed, but was pretty sure I’d failed at hiding my blush. “I really like them too though.” I paused to reach for the green tie and then placed it loosely around my neck. “Okay, your turn to guess.”

“All right, I think you’re a little self-conscious about yourself, but you try not to be.”

Pffft… “I—” well…I was going to deny it, but looking over at him I realized there was really no point in lying. Not if we wanted to see if we could work. “—don’t know… maybe… Just as a defense mechanism.”

“Hey, it’s all right.”

“I know.” I really did. It was just annoying to know that some of the media liked making little things a lot more complicated than they originally were. “When people look at you all the time it’s kind of necessary. I can’t imagine how it is for you being a prince and all.” I shrugged. “I’m just the daughter of a movie producer and a retired actress.”

“No, I think you’re a lot more than that.”

That caught me off guard and I looked over at him again with curiosity.  “How so?” I mumbled slightly flustered.

“You underrate yourself. You act as if you’re no one, but I know there’s someone in there that’s deeply passionate.”

I stared at the ground thoughtfully for a few seconds. Why did people think he was shy?  “You are better with words than I gave you credit for.” Then staring at him I clarified: “Though I wouldn’t say I underrate myself…I just” it took me a moment to find the right words “I don’t know, I guess I learned it’s better if I hide some of my cards from the public sometimes.” Learned it the hard way.

“You don’t need to hide from me.”

I smiled up at him and reached for the book in his hands. “Lucky you, I wasn’t trying to do so yet.”

“Yet?”

I rolled my eyes amused. Nothing gets past this one. “Or ever. As for your compliment…” I leaned in to give him a kick kiss on the cheek. “I like your occasional stutter.”

He blushed and I giggled at the sight. “I—Uh, thanks.”

“See? Adorable. Now, next object is….a Baguette from Chef Baguette’s kitchen.”

He only seemed slightly surprised. “Well, this’ll be fun.”

“It’ll be great; if he finds out we’ll blame it on you.” Then I placed the book on his bed, reached for his hand and led him out.

“So are you going in or am I?” He asked once we were in front of the kitchen.

I rolled my eyes and dragged him in. “Team work Haiden…think Mission Impossible.”

“Alright, we die together.” He whispered as we entered and I couldn’t avoid grinning. Man, am I liking this kid.

I dragged him all the way behind a counter and we sat on the floor. I was glad I’d forgotten about the date. All of the sneaking around would have been a lot more complicated in a dress. “Okay, your moment to shine. Where are the baguettes?”

“On the bread cabinet.”

I covered my mouth trying not to laugh. He was so on board with my ridiculous ideas it was an unbelievable but pleasant surprise. “Okay….” I peeked over the counter looking for the acclaimed cabinet, but the kitchen was way too big. “Uhh, where is the bread cabinet? I just know where he hides his chips so far.” I smirked over at him when I saw the curious grin he gave me. “Long story.” Mostly Mila and I searching every single cabinet in the middle of a sleepover.

“In the very back of the kitchen. In a safe.”

I snorted a laugh and then immediately covered my mouth. I looked back at Haiden blushing, but grinning all the same. “I promise I don’t always laugh like that.”

“I hope you do.” He said raising an eyebrow in amusement. Then he shook his head and gestured me to follow. “Let’s go.”

We started making our way to the back of the kitchen in a crawl and then I whispered. “I can’t believe he has a safe for his baguettes.”

“His name is Baguette. What do you expect?”

“I wonder if Azalea has a safe filled with Azalea’s on her house then.” I snickered.

“I wonder if Britain has Great Britain under lock and key.”

At that I burst out laughing. I quickly covered my mouth realizing my mistake, but it was a bit too late. “Did you hear that?” Baguette’s thick accent echoed in the kitchen.

“We better get in and out of here fast.” Haiden mumbled and then we crawled the rest of the way to the bread cabinet. There was in deed a safe next to it, a lock keeping the insides out of our reach. I was about to ask what we were going to do about that, but Haiden was one step ahead. “Do you happen to have a hair pin on you?”

I raised both eyebrows impressed. He had some pretty interesting talents he had forgotten to mention earlier. “Such a professional spy, please teach me your ways.” I smirked before taking a pin out of my hair. Lucky him I used pins to secure my braids sometimes.

It didn’t take him long to pick the lock. After a minute or so it clicked and fell off. Haiden’s face beamed at me with pride. “Voila. A baguette for the lady.” He announced, handing me a baguette from inside.

“Such skills, you underrate yourself.” I said taking the baguette.

“VHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING ERE. ZIS ES PUNISHABLE BY DEATH!” Baguette had finally seen us and started making his way toward us.

“Uh oh.” I smiled.

“Oh, we better go.” Haiden sputtered, standing up and pulling me with him to an exit.

A bubble of laughter erupted inside me and I couldn’t suppress it as we ran. The smell of different foods flooding my nose as we passed different areas of the kitchen, cooks and other staff members staring at us with confusion as we ran past them with Baguette yelling in the distance. “Ef someone es trying to steal ze baguettes, you vill feel ze wrath of Baguette Le Chef! I vill get you!”

“We better get outta here.” Haiden blurted as we ran. We reached the exit and it took us into the servant’s quarters. I noticed how there was an exit to the palace in there and made a mental note of it. Then, with my free hand, I grabbed a random napkin from a servant carrying a platter full of them. It was one of the fancy shmancy cloth ones.

“What next, My lady?”

I presented the napkin to him. “Well, I just got the napkin that was also on the list… and we have the baguette.” At that I was pretty sure I could still hear Baguette grumbling in the distance. “Uh… let’s get out of here and then do our second round of guessing.” I laughed again and Haiden joined me, dragging me further into the servant’s quarters.

“The maids are probably wondering why their future monarch is running around with a little redheaded girl.”

“Don’t forget I’m carrying a baguette and wearing your green tie.”

He gave me a glance and immediately stopped running. I almost stumbled with him, but then he looked at me and reached for the tie. He untied the loose knot I’d made and replaced it with a perfect one instead, so that it was placed neatly around my neck. “There, now it’s perfect.”

I grabbed the end of the tie assessing his work and smiled. “Oh, how have I survived without your fashion sense.”

“Obviously. So are we going to guess yet?”

“Yes, you go first now.”

“All right. You’ve… never had a boyfriend.”

Ouch. I gasped pretending to be offended. “Haiden Schreave, why would you ever think that? You are lucky enough to get to date me.”

He laughed. “You’re practically a child.”

Oh, you want to play like that huh? “You’re barely older than me honey.”

“You’re still a minor.” He said matter of fact-ly, but then in a teasing tone he added: “And you’re tiny.”

HOW DARE HE CALL ME TINY? “No,” I poked his chest “you’re tall, there’s a difference.”

He still seemed amused as he stared at the finger I’d used to poke him. “Did I get it right, though?”

I crossed my arms in front of my chest. “Technically…no.”

“Technically?”

“Well, the media kind of expected me to have a boyfriend so I had one…for a while, but we were really just friends.”

“So not technically.”

“We agreed to be a couple for a while so people would stop asking why we were single” I shrugged. “Mutual agreement.”

“So technically or not technically?” He questioned and I struggled to give an answer as I thought of Josh.

We went out to get dinner or watch movies, in rare occasions we even did picnics to make it more “romantic”. We’d been like that on my last months in Angeles before moving to Dominica. We used my temporary move away as an excuse to break up peacefully.

It mostly started because paparazzi wouldn’t stop asking if there was anyone special out there I hadn’t told them about, and because everyone was expecting Josh to date the co-star of the movie he was working on. It was common for actors and actresses to ‘fall in love with each other’ to help the publicity of their own movies, but Ellie Foster made it pretty clear she would “never in her life date a Lynley again.” Josh was not any more interested either. After all she had broken up with his older brother just because she thought he didn’t “act like a Two with all the painting he did.” It wasn’t that she wasn’t smart or pretty, she was just too…condescending.

With me and Josh dating however, people would stop asking me about nonexistent secret boyfriends and stop suggesting him and Ellie become a couple. It was a win-win situation as stupid as having to do it was. Since that moment on I became Josh’s permanent companion on movie premieres—which to be honest happened a lot even before we became “a couple”. We kept regularly seeing each other on set whenever I was there with my parents and we hung out a lot out off set as well. Considering we were already close friends, it was mostly acting like the love we shared was a romantic kind of love… so it wasn’t all a charade. We really did have fun and enjoyed each other’s company. I even thought I might like him for a while…but by the end it was always pretty platonic.

“I don’t know…what would you consider technically?” I asked Haiden.

“I don’t know depends on what you consider dating is. For example, I don’t consider that we’re dating. I believe we’re both in a mutual contract at this point, but I wouldn’t say dating.”

That’s certainly interesting. I raised my eyebrow. “So this is not a date?”

“Mm, technically no. I like to call it a “Rendezvous with a possible spouse”. But legally, I’m supposed to call it a date.”

I laughed at the name he used. “Okay, okay, at what point would it be a date then?”

“When we mutually agree it is…I barely know you. It’d be weird to say we’re dating along with 29 other girls.”

I nodded tapping my chin as I examined him. I agreed with what he was saying, but I hadn’t been expecting those to be his thoughts. “True, it’s kind of weird…” really weird actually. “I’m beginning to think this Selection was not entirely your idea.”

“Oh, it definitely wasn’t.”

I thought about the rebels who had killed the second Azalea. “Hmm…any particular reasons the country needed it right now?”

“Not really. I was just of age and jolly ol’ dad decided it was time.”

“Okay, well hopefully I survive here long enough to get a real date with you then. And also I guess I technically haven’t had a boyfriend.”

“Trust me, I think you will.” He said it without stuttering, but then he seemed to realize he’d said it aloud and cleared his throat. “And wonderful, I’m right.”

I grinned trying to let him know his comment had not gone unnoticed. “Let’s see, a compliment… You’re a lot funnier than you think you are, or than what you pretend to be at least.”

“Why, thank you, Lady Aileen. You’re turn now.”

“Hum, I’m pretty sure you write. I don’t know what, but you do. I mean, with that bookshelf and the bunch of papers on your trashcan… that is practically overloaded with paper balls may I add.”

He laughed. “You got me.”

“Yes! Now a compliment, plus a detail. Is it novels? Songs? Short stories? …poetry? I’ve heard everyone blabbing about how much you love it.”

“Nope, no details. I am not contractually obligated. As for your compliment… I like that you talk back to me.”

“I’ll figure out eventually, but what do you mean I talk back to you?”

“You don’t brush off anything. If I’m wrong you definitely make sure I know.”

It was a simple compliment, but nonetheless pleasant. “Ahh, well I’m glad you don’t hate me for it,” I winked “someone’s gotta do it. Now, we’re almost done with the list. Next thing requires me to get my camera from my room.”

“All, right,” he said gesturing toward a door near us “after you.”

I opened the door and called for Janet and Anne, but no one replied. I entered and for once they weren’t there. Haiden slowly walked in behind me, double checking no one saw him enter.

“You´re scared to get caught in my room as well?”

“Of course.”

I started moving and picking up the polaroid photos I’d left on the floor and around my desk before I’d left for the gardens. “Why? I get your room, but…well…this is kind of your property.”

“Don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea.”

I thought again about ‘Exposing Illea’ implying me and David seemed a bit too close. David. My cousin. “Fair enough I guess. I am sorry for the mess as well” I said, still picking up photos from what to him probably seemed like random places. “Anne and Janet do a better job at cleaning really, I just told them not to move some stuff. I don´t want them to accidentally misplace things.” I had a weird way of organizing my pictures.

He laughed. “It looks perfect.”

I smiled and placed the pictures neatly on my desk. “Of course you´d say that considering how your trashcan looks.” I teased, approaching my new bed to kneel in front of it and look for my instant camera under it.

“You know you have plenty of storage in other places rather than the bed.”

“Yes, but no one serious would look under the bed. It´s ridiculous to hide something there…well, unless they are looking for something very important, then they would turn the room upside down.” I took out the camera from under the bed. “Would you ever think of looking under the bed?”

“Um, yes. That’s literally the first place people who have something to hide put things.”

“Fine,” I said rolling my eyes. “I’ll look for a better place….” To be honest I wasn’t trying to hide it there, I just didn’t want people using it without permission. It was a special gift. If I placed it somewhere else—where people might just pick it up while in my room to look at it—I would find myself trying to politely take it back without showing I was bothered by them grabbing it in the first place.

“Take it from a professional spy.” Haiden quipped.

I stood up and remembered how he opened the lock back in the kitchen. “You owe me a hair pin by the way, but you have to teach me that trick.”

To my surprise he took the hair pin from his pocket, but held it high above his head, out of my reach.

You little—I placed a hand on my hip and looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Against what you have established, I am not a child, so I will not behave like one…” I said it as eloquently as possible.  Heather would be proud. Then I waited for a couple of seconds, expecting him to give ot back, but he didn’t and I was bored and I am Aileen. He’s already seen how intense I am. I sighed. Heather might not be as proud. “Oh who am I kidding, that´s no fun.” And then I tackled the prince.

He gasped as we hit the ground. “Oh, God.” Between laughs he stuck the pin on his hair and shoved me aside. “You’ll never get it now.”

I stood after him. “That’s not fair! Why are you so tall?!”

“Because taller is better!”

“Pfft, I doubt so,” I argued, reaching for the blanket on my bed and throwing it over his head in an attempt to stop him “it makes you a bigger target!

He laughed but kept on walking and crashed into a wall. Didn’t really protest though. “You’re not getting this pin.”

I snorted a laugh, but didn’t care for it at the moment. “Be careful where you’re going, and I’m getting that pin!”

Before I could do anything however he spun around and unraveled himself from the blanket. In seconds he was tying it around me. “No wait!” I tried to stop him, but failed and then ended up tripping over the blanket and bumping into the shelf I had. Because of the tangled mess we were with the blanket, we both ended up on the floor, next to each other. We had burst out laughing as soon as we hit the ground. I hadn’t heard him laugh that hard all day.

“You should let me keep the hair pin.”

I took part of the blanket from my face and proclaimed dramatically: “MY HONER DEPENDS ON GETTING THAT PIN!” But just then the carton box I’d placed on the shelf we bumped into finally tipped over and fell. All of my little paper swans and planes showered on us and the empty  box landed on Haiden’s head.

“Well, this is inconvenient.”

I laughed again. “I like origami.”

I unraveled my hands from the blanket and took the box off his head. He smiled down at me and I took the opportunity to reach for the pin. “And so my honor is restored…”

He backed away and wrapped his hand around my wrist before I could grasp it. “Not so fast.”

I tried to hold him still, biting my lip in concentration in an attempt to reach for it with my other hand. “Is it so hard to make you stay in one place?”

“I never stay in one place.” He chuckled.

“Pfft, well first of all that’s a lie.” I kept reaching for the pin and he kept laughing, trying to stop me from getting it, playfully elbowing me away.

“No it isn’t.”

“Oh really, how do you sleep then…” The door creaked and from the corner of my eye I realized how it slowly opened, I glanced back at Haiden with wide eyes. We were on a corner between my bed and shelf, surrounded by a bunch of origami figures, a tangled mess in blankets. It didn’t get any more random than that. I immediately reached for the blanket and untangled it just in time to throw it on top of him. Anne came in with a batch of towels in hand. I was glad the blanket was for a king size bed. Big enough for a prince. Get it? No? Fine.

“Lady Ai—” she stopped midsentence looking at both of us. “Uh…who’s that?” She gestured at the blanket-covered Haiden with her head.

“Oh hey Anne! It’s just Mila.” Silence ensued as Anne frowned and Haiden remained silent. I cleared my throat before elbowing him on the ribs. “Don’t be shy Mila, say hi.”

He only squeaked a little. I could tell he was trying not to laugh. He’d be a horrible actor.

Anne seemed very confused. “Umm..”

“Yeah, uh,” my voice cracked a little as I avoided bursting into laughter “that’s how Mila says hi apparently.” I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. This was ridiculous. We were ridiculous.

“O-okay..?” I could tell Anne knew something was off but I only stood and tried helping Haiden up as well, making sure the blanket didn’t fall off.  “Umm yeah we…” I eyed the room for a sec and then reached for a pillow as an idea formed in my head. “We were going to have a sleepover. At her room.” I shoved the pillow at Haiden’s chest. “Right Mila?”

He squeaked in agreement. I did my best not to laugh again. What kind of girl squeals to talk Haiden?

Anne raised an eyebrow. “It’s the middle of the day, why would you have a sleepover right now? And didn’t the last one end up with a burnt bush in the gardens?”

“We’re just getting ready…And yes there was a burnt bush, but Mila and I were some of the few that tried to stop them.” This was true. Remembering that night I leaned to whisper in Haiden’s ear and said: “By the way if it weren’t for us and Elaine your room might have been the one lit up.”

He laughed lightly and whispered back. “Well, thanks.” Then he cleared his throat and slouched down to my height. As if that would go unnoticed now. There was really no point in keeping this going probably, but we did.

Anne squinted at us. “Well Mila, you sure are tall…”

Haiden did a girly giggle in response and I snorted a laugh.

“Yeah,” I cleared my throat and waved a hand in dismissal. “It’s the vitamins!” Then I dragged him out of there, in the rush I accidentally made him bump into a wall. “Oops, better wacth where you’re going Mila.” I snickered, getting him past the door. “Bye Anne! I’m sorry for the origami mess, I’ll clean it up, don’t worry about it.” Then I pushed him outside. “Oh! Almost forgot” I went back in and grabbed the camera. “Perfect. Let’s go.”

He tossed the blanket onto a chair in the hallway. “Well, that was close.”

“That’s the worst impression of a girl I’ve ever seen.” I smirked.

“Well, I’d hope so.” Haiden emphasized and it took me a second to get it before laughing.

“Oh, shut up. Also, now you owe me one for saving your royal behind,” I extended my hand in front of him “so I wish for my honor back.”

“Maybe next time.”

I huffed, not willing to fight for the pin on the palace’s halls as well. “Fine, I’ll trust you with it…for now.”

“Great, because my next option would be to swallow it and my digestive tract could not handle that.”

I made a face. “Ew, that’s my honor you’re talking about.” Then I shook my head and held up the camera. “Now next item! We need a selfie with a guard.”

“I can do that.” He reached for something in his pocket and took out a walkie talkie.

Oh wow. “Modern.” I intoned.

He gave me an amused glance and started talking into the walkie talkie. “Knox, you there?”

I hovered next to him and yelled: “Hey Knox, how you doing?”

There was only static for a second, then a gruff voice finally spoke up. “Uh, Prince Haiden, I’m here, but who’s that?”

“Oh, no one.” He said rolling his eyes and I shoved him. “But, could you come to my room. I need help with something.”

“Uh, all right I’ll be there soon.”

When the walkie-talk was over I elbowed him. “No one? Excuse you, Mr. you underrate yourself, I am not no one.” Then I reached for the blanket and threw it over his face again. Me being petty. “Who’s Knox by the way?”

“A guard. Like you wanted.”

“I figured that, but aren’t you worried he’ll see me in your room?”

“No, Knox knows me and he’s no snitch.”

“A friend then?”

“Sort of. Let’s go.”

Once we were back on his room he asked: “So… are you having fun?”

“Are you kidding? Today has been great, one of the best treasure hunts I’ve ever had.” I said, laughing as I sat on the edge of his bed to wait for Knox. “I was actually worried I’d scare you with my…Aileen-ness.” I shrugged at my own creation of random words. “But I realized it was better for you to see it from the get go.”

He chuckled. “Definitely not. I haven’t had this much fun in a long time.”

That was the best outcome I could have wished for. “Glad I could help.”

Then someone knocked on the door and Haiden walked over to it. “Knox, glad you could come.”

A guard with dirty-blonde hair came in and glanced at me. “Am I interrupting something?”

I couldn’t avoid snickering. “Yeah, we were about to passionately make out Knox, you just ruined the moment.”

He slowly walked out of the room again. “Well, don’t let me stop you.”

I tilted my head at him and raised an eyebrow at Haiden. “He doesn’t have a good sense of sarcasm does he?”

Haiden shook his head and replied: “Oh he knew what you were saying. Very well.” Then he gestured at Knox to come back in.

I frowned, slightly confused about what that meant, but I didn’t get a chance to question it as Haiden explained we needed a selfie. When he gave Knox my camera part of me cringed inside, just a little…I had been the one to give Haiden the camera in the first place though—prepared for both of them to be holding it— so it was fine.

Knox laughed and grabbed camera. “Don’t mind if I do.”

I ran over to stand behind him and poked my head over his shoulder. I had to stand on the tip of my toes because he was practically as tall as Haiden, if not taller. “Ugh, why are you all so tall.”

Knox took the picture and tossed the camera at Haiden. I chewed the inside of my cheek to stop myself from reprimanding him for throwing it with such disregard. “Lemme know if you need any more eye candy, babe.”

Wait… “What?

He was out of the room before I could question him again.

“Anything else left?” Haiden asked with a laugh.

I frowned at the door for a few seconds after Knox left, and then turned to look at him. “Well, I was hoping you could choose the last item.”

He gave that a thought. “Up for a challenge?”

I raised my eyebrows mischievously. “You’ve spent a whole day with me, what do you think?”

“Lady Alexandria’s hair brush.” He smirked. “Or comb, whichever.”

My mouth fell open and I raised both eyebrows. Oh my, he’s even more intense than me. I didn’t even mention how he’d gotten her name wrong.

“Or would her soul be better?” He added, mimicking the mischievous smile I’d had a few seconds ago.

I slowly grinned as my brain wrapped itself around his idea. “Oh wow, going for the big leagues. You sure you wanna get in the way of Alexandra’s hair? That could get us killed.”  I was only partially joking with the last statement. Apparently she tolerated me so far, but I wondered if she was just acting like that because she recognized my dad’s last name. My dad hadn’t worked with her before, but she might know about him if she recognized movie producers.

“It’s too big. She won’t see us.” He joked, dismissing my concerns. Then he tilted his head. “You coming?”

I bit the inside of my cheek thinking it through. It was risky, but I couldn’t deny I wanted to go. If someone ever went into my room to get something as simple as a comb under these circumstances, and then told me about it, I would find it strangely hilarious. I knew other girls would too… but Alex? I didn’t have her entirely figured out yet.  “I’m going to regret this…” I sighed “but at least she doesn’t already hate me. I might survive this.” Probably.

I followed him and he grinned. Most of my concerns diminished after I grinned back.

“You knock and see if she’s in there.” He whispered when we were almost by her room.

I walked the rest of the way to her door and knocked, calling her name, claiming Azalea was looking for her. No one replied so I gestured for Haiden to come. It seemed like the coast was clear. The door wasn’t locked—which I found rather odd considering I always made sure mine was—so we just opened it. Haiden mentioned the maids and I poked my head inside, asking if there was anyone there. After I said I was looking for Alex and got no reply we went in.

As we entered I looked over my shoulder at Haiden. “My guess is you’ve never had a girlfriend.”

“Please, you’re not even trying.”

For a moment I thought that meant I’d guessed wrong, but when I asked if it was a real girlfriend he said: “Nope.”

I was confused by this. “Technical like mine then?”

“Nope, not technical. Just nope.”

I realized then I’d misunderstood his initial reply.  “Then I’m right! I thought you said I wasn’t trying because I guessed incorrectly, now I get it…” He laughed at this  and I shrugged with a smile. “It’s a fair guess, for all I know you might have had one.”

Haiden almost seemed baffled by the suggestion. “You’ve known me this long and you think I’ve dated before?”

He said that as if we’d known each other for ages which made my smile widen. I pushed him playfully, heading for the vanity to look for the comb. “Now, who’s underrating themselves? You got some tricks up your sleeve.”

“Tricks, really?” He seemed amused by the idea and I smirked.

“Well, yeah. You’re funny, dare I say even bold considering what you just picked for us to get now.” I added, gesturing at the room. “Smart, nice…I could probably list a couple more, but compliments aren’t free in this hunt, remember?”

He laughed. “I suppose so. It’s my turn isn’t it? Well, I’ll say you’re very funny, cute when you don’t try too hard, and not afraid of a challenge.”

“Jeez, now I try too hard.” I chided, shaking my head with a smile. Then I finally turned to look at the vanity in search for the comb. I made sure not to touch anything since I didn’t want to move things out of place; I wouldn’t want people moving all of my stuff around. I also didn’t pay much attention to any of the objects that I saw. I just concentrated on the shape of a comb and looked over the stuff on the vanity. As I did I clarified: “For the record, I don’t try too hard, I just like being dramatic. It is second nature…when I’m not in public.”

He shook his head, laughing. “No, that was a joke. You’re cute most of the time.” He paused only for a second. “You and your small, redhead self.”

I didn’t look back at him but my smile widened again. “Thanks Haiden, don’t forget freckled…” Then I saw the comb behind a couple of different perfumes. I reached for it carefully and slowly turned around to show it to him. “Well, look at what I found.”

“Well, let’s get out of here.”

After that there was only one thing left. Proof of the hunt.

With all the items on Haiden’s bed I picked up the napkin and started folding it to make a swan.

“You know napkin origami?”

“First of all, I’m pretty sure it’s called napkin folding not napkin origami.” I laughed, finishing the swan. Then I held it dramatically in my hand for him to see. “And secondly, yes, I know a bit…more than most people at least.”

Between a fake cough he mumbled: “Napkin origami sounds cooler.”

I only gave him a sideways grin before reaching for the book and placing the swan on top of it. Then I placed the comb to rest on the swan alongside the instant picture with Knox. I placed it all in his hands. He gave me a questioning look, but didn’t ask anything. I took a step away to look him up and down, and then decided he needed to hold the book in just one hand. He would need the other one to hold the baguette.

I made him raise his hand up as if the baguette was a sword and then, realizing my blanket was there, I added it as a cape over his shoulders. Then I pictured the frame in my head. “Hmm, yeah, this works.”

“This is a tad uncomfortable.” Haiden claimed, but the smile on his face was genuine.

I quickly reached for my camera and snapped a picture without really checking the frame, then hurried to help him with the book. “Any other posing ideas were I may actually angle the camera?”

He didn’t say anything for a second but then he jumped onto the bed and made a ‘draw me like one of your French girls’ pose from Titanic.

Oh, my freaking chips. I burst out laughing, and because I was trying not too I snorted again.

“Make me beautiful.” He cooed and I flat out lost it.

I was pretty sure my face had turned as red as a rose from laughing. The whole thing was perfect for a blackmail photo to tease him with later, but I couldn’t hold the camera steady because of my laughter. After a while I finally managed to snap the picture of him with the rest of the items on the bed. Haiden laughed with me and placed the baguette on his mouth like one would a rose during a tango. I leaned on a bed post clutching my stomach, still laughing.

You know how sometimes you laugh and you’ve been doing it for so long it starts hurting? Like you are struggling to catch your breath, but you just can’t stop? It was one of those moments. This was Prince Haiden? The shyest member of the royal family?  “You would make a perfect Rose.” I joked.

“But where are your brushes and paint?”

Oh holy macaroni. My laugh immediately returned full on. “Oh my, must have misplaced them…” I sputtered, even though I was dying inside as I said it, and my stomach hurt from laughing, and I was probably a freckled tomato.

He sat up and I could tell he wasn’t going to stop. It was like he didn’t want me to stop laughing. “And are you my Jack?” He alluded.

I was so taken aback by that one I actually slipped from the post onto the bed. My laughter still echoed through the room. I tried to calm down and raised an eyebrow at him. “Would you like me to be?”

He reached for my cheek and I knew my blushing involuntarily intensified (if that was even possible), but then he held out the baguette to me and said: “Hold onto this and don’t let go.”

THIS NERD. I started laughing again but after a moment I cleared my throat and grabbed the tip of the baguette. Then in the most serious way possible: “Haiden, this Baguette isn’t big enough for both of us.”

“Then…” he paused to sniffle “one of us must leave.”

He pushed me off the bed.

“Whaa..” I wrapped my hand around his wrist just in time to bring him down with me. We both started laughing again on the ground. When we finally calmed down I looked at him and clicked my tongue. “Great Haiden now we’re both gonna die from hypothermia.”

He hummed. “Finally.”

I snickered and nudged him before staring at his ceiling. “You’re so dramatic.” Maybe even as much as I am. I took a bite from the baguette and couldn’t blame the chef for having them under a locked safe. I offered Haiden a piece. “Want some before we freeze to death?”

He accepted the offer. “I wonder what Baguette is thinking right now.”

“Hmm, maybe he’s considering what poison to use on our dinner…Or planning world dominance, you know.”

“I’ll have it treated, don’t worry.”

I smiled over at him. “Haiden saving the day.”

“Always. So are we going to guess again? One last time?”

“Oh! Yes, we’re missing one. You go first.”

“All right, um, you have conflicted feelings about me.”

Maybe. “Hmm, depends on what you mean by conflicted.”

“But I’m right.” He cajoled.

“I don’t know.” I rolled my eyes, smirking. “We haven’t even had our first date yet remember?”

“Oh, right.” He chuckled softly. “How could I forget? Maybe someday we’ll have that first date.”

I kept staring at the ceiling and started fidgeting with the green tie that was still around my neck. “I have to admit today could have been a pretty good date.” I only dared to look at him from the corner of my eye, but I noticed him lean closer to me. 

“Well, maybe our first real date will be even better.”

I turned my head to face him. His brown eyes stared intently at my own and I found myself moving my head closer to his as well. “It better be or I’m holding you responsible.” I said, smiling softly.

“I’ll be sure to make it worth your time.”

“Good.” This time I smiled coyly. “My guess is you feel attracted to me right now.”

“Possibly.”

My lips turned into a thin line. “Does that mean I get a compliment?”

“Sure.” It took him a couple of seconds to come up with his reply. “You make me…rethink things.”

“Things like…?” I ventured, hesitantly.

“Things.”

I pressed my lips together again, but then smiled with a nod. “Things. Okay. Well, I guess you get a compliment too….” I had to take a moment to pick mine as well. “You make me feel comfortable in a sense.”

“I’m glad.”

“Me too.” I said, staring back at the ceiling.

“So… this is the end, I guess.”

“So…who’s going to return Alexandra’s comb?”

“Mm, stick it in a potted plant.” He suggested.

I glared at him. “She’ll know its missing…I guess I could tell her I was near her room and in need of a comb and just borrowed it.” Not entirely a lie.

“No, don’t tell her anything.”

“Yeah, she’d probably kill me.” I smirked. “Though it was your idea…Maybe I’ll give it to her maid.”

“Probably a good idea.”

“Yeah, that way no one gets killed.”

We stayed silent for a while after that, just casually lying on the floor, as if it were completely normal. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence however. It was the kind of silence you agree on just to give someone else company. Does that make sense?

I wasn’t sure how long it had been by the time I sat up, but I knew our little rendezvous was reaching its end. I hovered over his face while he was still lying on the ground and the tie swung near him. “Any chance you’ll tell me the story behind the green tie before this is over?” I said, still curious about why it was his favorite tie. That was probably the vaguest most interesting thing he’d mentioned during my interview.

Haiden smiled and reached for the tie when it swung near his ear. “We better save something to talk about for next time.”

I grinned wondering what crazy ideas we would have during our second date. “A story for next time then.”

I moved aside and he sat up too. “We should probably go.” He said, standing up.

“Are you walking me to my room?” I asked, picking up the book with the other things from our treasure hunt. I was happy to take that beautiful book with me.

“I had a lot of fun today.”

I snapped a surprise picture of him then. Last picture of the day. I grinned at his smile on the instant picture that came out.  “One of the best not-so-quite dates I’ve ever had.” I handed him the picture for him to see.

“If this is not a date, then I’d love to see a real one someday.”

“Agreed…Mutual agreement. When we mutually agree we’re having a date then it will no longer be a…” I paused trying to remember his exact words. “What did you call it? Rendezvous with a possible spouse? It sounds like we might reach the agreement sooner rather than later. Can’t wait to see how that turns out.”

We smiled at each other.

“Thank you for your time Haiden.” I did a dramatic curtsy.

“What are you doing here?” Janet asked when she came out of the closet.

I looked up from Haiden’s pictures and gave her a puzzled look. “Umm, this is my room…?”

“Anne said you were having a sleepover with Mila tonight.” As if called upon, Anne appeared on the bathroom’s doorway.

“Oh, yes. We were organizing a couple of thing…we’re done now. We’re not meeting up again until later.”

“Okay. I’ll have your clothes ready then.”

I nodded thinking I’d dodged a bullet, but then Anne spoke up. “Why are you wearing a tie?”

I placed my hand on the knot without thinking and then looked back at her. She was giving me a very suspicious glare. How had we forgotten about the tie? “I’m—trying to make a fashion statement.” It sounded more like a question than an answer.

Janet tilted her head in confusion.                                                            

Anne raised both eyebrows as if unimpressed with my excuse. “Wasn’t your date with the prince today?”  

“Uh…” Busted.

She shook her head and walked over to sit on my desk’s chair. It seemed like she was waiting for an explanation. “You know, Lady Mila seems to have very prince-like shoes.”

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