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aineryeo · 3 years

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Sweet Tea ௹ OSAMU

Sweet Hibiscus Tea — Better Twin. 🍵

SYNOPSIS: You are not a protagonist but your best friend definitely is. When will you ever be, sweet little side-character? » 6.2k Words

THEME: A li'l bit of a slow burn love story, angst, just a treat as my first fic in a year. | Bit of profanity, cussin', teen drama. And use of dialogue references!

NOTE: Low-key felt like this was crap, rip. I still love you so much ‘Samu :( I may have not written this the best

If you were to think of what your role in life was, you were sure you were a comic relief character, and your screen time was just cut short because the viewers in the show you call, “Life” are not giving you the best reviews. With the amount of times you felt like you were cycling through all your days the same, waking up… Waking.. Up.. Wake— Yeah, that was about it.

Everything else was an objective agenda. You were a sufficient klutz, whatever that paper was. You ponder, in your inner monologue while you’re tapping your push-pen on your school desk in Inarizaki.

“— And we’ll be designing our own living rooms as part of the Course Outline for Interior Studies in the general subject.”

You had a best friend, continuing to ignore the incessant babbles, you say as you write a little note to remind yourself to think of a living room design to finish the work quickly later. You had a best friend, who you can easily say is the main character of life. You swear, as she sat close to the window, and how she wasn’t mean, she was charming; it was so hard not to like her. But she’s also insecure, keeps to herself enough, having you by her side.

“Hear that ‘Samu?”

“What now, ‘Sumu?”

“Interior Designin’! Weren’t ya listenin’ ya scrub.” Bleach-blonde hair.“What about it?” Disinterest; Bleached hair too, but ash-grey.

“Ain’t Kori-Kori real good at stuff like this?”

You observed the two famed twins of Inarizaki High. Actually no, you were forced to; how? Well, you sat between them, not like that ever stopped anyone, nor did it ever interfere with your boring experience of being a 2nd mid-year Senior. You just wanted to get up, and leave, get a job or something; not going to lie.

“Is there anyone talking at the back right there? Anything the class would like to hear, pretty sure.” Professor said, which immediately shut the two up, the other was blatant and oblivious, even whistling.

“Guessed so.” Your professor went on right after.

Your chin was resting on the heel of your palm now, but you felt someone roughly, no really, they roughly tapped your shoulder, the touch was from a clearly heavy hand. It came from your right, which was…

“Hey missy, pass this on to my brother, will ‘ya?” He grinned widely, his other hand that held the pen used to write a note in the torn paper from his notebook that most likely didn’t have any notes despite it being mid-year. You let out a bit of a grunt, not moving from your position, but you did use your hand that was tapping your table to pass it on to the other Miya without sparing a glance.

“...”

Your arm was about to die.

You turned to the other Miya, a small frown on your face as he ignored your outstretched hand, his eyes were closed, arms crossed but he was definitely not sleeping, it was obvious enough. So you tried to aggressively wave your arm that held the letter while keeping an eye on the doting teacher upfront, trying not to be obvious. His brother had noticed that he was ignoring you as well, shrugging when your frown deepened, back straightening on your desk, your free hand now tapping on your table instead of being a rest for your head.

“Hey ‘Samu ‘ya jerk…!” Atsumu whispered, a volume tad higher, to his brother who proceeded to ignore him; and technically, you too.

You groaned and ignored the two, equally annoying twins that are involving you into a situation you don’t want to get involved in. So you just slammed, actually no, not slammed exactly but you did harshly place the torn paper that contained some unnamed letter from Atsumu directed to Osamu. Wistfully, this was noticed by your professor.

“Y/N. I believe it’s been made clear that passing notes is not allowed in my class, rather, on any occasion that involves other subjects as well.” They scolded.

You sucked a breath in between your teeth, your hand ran through your hair in an attempt to calm you down. “Switch seats with Yokori. This seating will last ‘till the end of the year, ‘lest you misbehave again. This applies to everyone else who has been swapped constantly.”

Yokori gave you a solemn smile, knowing you hated this, she gathered her belongings and quickly sat to avoid any more trouble; even opting to give you a pat on your shoulder on the way to her desk near the window, though not quite beside. One classmate separated you from being directly beside the scenery of school grounds that held the gym where your schools’ famous volleyball team resides for practices. Actually, this classmate was one of their players, Suna Rintaro? Your impression on him was that he was quiet… Enough, if not provoked or talked to at all, which you guessed was part of your luck. Because you were definitely not going to talk to him, less it required you to by any of your classes together.

So you sat, your professor continued, and your eyes landed on your best friend that sat on your previous seat, since your first year of middle school. Bored expression on once again, your thoughts dialed back, and you noticed a quick interaction from Atsumu towards your best friend who flushed slightly from the two’s attention, noticing that even the twin who ignored you earlier began perking up, just a little bit. And the feeling was slight but you felt a tinge of annoyance, proceeding to push it to the back of your mind, not letting the feelings against your best friend surface. Because she was good, and undeserving of it, obviously.

The bell rang, it was time for lunch!

Lunch is a happy time, because you can buy yourself chocolate, and you can, well, eat lunch. What else is there for? You were bored out of your mind at home after doing your homework, and studying enough for the day so you practiced cooking. Which you admit, was very enjoyable, especially when you finish. Today was tuna sushi rolls, seaweed-strapped spam meat, seasoned rice, and hot tamarind soup in your insulating tumbler. You didn’t notice light gray irisess eyeing you in your little daydream about your lunch for today.

“Y/N, you good?” Yokori, said best friend went next to you, who had just finished gathering your lunch bag. You nodded, smile small. “Yep, let’s go.”

The class dispersed quickly, you two walked side-by-side as she timidly told you a story about her situation earlier.

“So Atsumu-san was passing notes to his brother Osamu, right? T’was so weird because they kept asking me questions, but Atsumu-san was nice, he wanted help with that Interior Designing project we have going on.” She laughed, scratching her cheek. You nodded along to her story, she was used to your rather quiet demeanor, she knew you were still listening. “They said it’d be cool to attend their after-school volleyball practice.”

“Mmh. Really? They’re annoying though.” You humored her, to which she chuckled.

“I mean… It shouldn’t be bad to try it, right?” She said with a big grin, bright.

You jutted your lips forward as you bobbed your head in agreement, already taking your chopsticks and lunch out when you found a free table. “I guess so.” You said, mouth chewing on a roll.

You pour a portion of soup to get the food down your throat onto your tumbler’s cap that serves as the cup, and drank, “So I told them you’re coming with me, I’d be too nervous by myself… Hehe..” and spat.

“Kori, what?”

“Come with me…” She looked at you, nervously smiling with her eyebrows raised in mock questioning, “-please.”

“Okay.”

“I promise, I’ll ask you next ti— wait, really? Holy shit, Y/N, thank you! I’ll pay you back, for sure. I didn’t expect you to agree quickly, d’you have a crush on any of the VBC members, perhaps?” She teased.

You were eating continually, mouth full of rice as you pointed your metal chopsticks toward her. Speaking with your mouth full, “I don’t think there was any point trying to say no if I’d say yes in the end anyway. It already happened, what can I really do?”

She nodded in understanding, you were always like this, relaxed about what happened around. It was worth idolizing, at least. Your head felt like it was burning, the back, you mean. Was someone staring?

You were now sitting outside of the gym, deciding to hang around outside instead of watching sweaty boys play for hours. Kori became more relaxed, so you took the go-mark and asked to leave when you noticed that she was. The team was fond of her, you note, Shinsuke Kita the Captain even thanking her for thinking of buying them snacks and helping them around with their manager to fill up the boys’ water bottles. The team gave her attention and copied their captain in terms of providing gratification for her deeds. You heard her ‘lax conversation next to the banter with the twins that was a normal recurrence.

You were simply a drifting particle, a bystander.

Actually wait, you remembered that you had packed yourself a little snack in case you had to stay in school for some surprise activity you forgot about, or situations like this exactly. So you took out your little box of homemade onigiris, not noticing the figure looming at the door. It was their break, and you were about to bite.

“Hey, that yours?” You hear, stopping your bite mid-way, turning your head to see ash-grey.

“Huh.”

“Ya deaf or what, missy?” The nerve.

You looked at him, and bit on the prism-shaped rice, then looked forward once again, closing your eyes even. ‘Till you heard shuffling and a sleazy figure sitting next to yours. That was when you opened your eyes, mouth slightly agape. Osamu Miya, sat next to you, his legs spread, and his arms were holding his whole posture as his head faced yours.

“If yer gonna look at me like that, the least ya could do is gimme one, little miss.”

You shook your head and swallowed. “Stop calling me little miss, old man.”

“Hoho, old man?” He says, humoring you, you can smell his cologne from here, mixed with sweat from his practice. He leaned forward, his arms now intertwining, resting on his knees, he was facing you with a small smile.

“Yeah, I’d call you shit hair but your hair ain’t the color.” You shrugged, but it was the type of shrug where you slightly move your hands outward. So when you did, the hand that held your bitten snack was when the big fox ate his fill. “Mm, tastes good.”

“Fucki-” You screeched. His eyes went wide when you just shoved the onigiri in his mouth, “It has your germs now, better not choke, gran’pa.”

Osamu was trying to give you a snide reply back but he couldn’t, with the rice stuck in, he just kept chewing. As you stood up and yelled to Kori that you were leaving. You were a side character, nothing more, you thought; as you walked away from the boy who had tried reaching to you, but you failed to notice.

“So… He invited me to their house to hang out.” Yokori said happily on the phone, you were trying to sketch a few designs you felt like doing so hummed, already quite satisfied, spinning on your chair right after. “So…”

“No.”

“But I haven’t said anything yet!”

“You were about to ask me if I can come with you because you’re nervous to go alone, the usual, hm?”

“...”

“Hm?”

“...Yes.”

“No.”

“Please?”

“N-”

“I’ll order you takeout pizza!”

“...Okay.”

You heard her cheering yes! On the other line, to which you just slumped in your chair to. And so, the day came and you were right behind Kori, who was knocking on the Miya residence as of the moment. The one who greeted the both of you was Osamu Miya, you internally groaned, their parents were off, you heard.

“Tsumu!” Your best friend smiles, greeting the other twin brightly; and smiling so wide at the twin at the door. “Hello ‘Samu!” She said, before the blonde had pushed past the door to beam at her.

“Brought your li’l friend along, cutie?” Atsumu jokes, rustling your friend’s hair before beckoning the two of you to come in. You walk past Osamu who you had mild grudges with. Your friend turned to you, “I’ll be helping Atsumu with some plates for the project, we’ll be up in his room!” She said, innocently.

“Mmh, okay. I’ll stay here?” You asked, more to yourself, you didn’t really know where to stay. This wasn’t your place.

“Accommodate the guest ‘Samu, I need’a do important school stuff.” Atsumu waved off as the two walked up the stairs on the way to the boy’s room, pretty sure. You stood there in the middle for a couple minutes, unsure. The renowned ‘less annoying’ Miya was sitting on one of their kitchen stools, his cheek digging into his palm, just staring at you. You stared back. He stared back. You were both staring.

You broke. “Not gonna let me sit, or anything?”

“Sit anywhere or something.” He droned, still looking at you. He was enjoying it.

So you looked at the couch beside you, then spared a glance at him, about to sit until he spoke again, “Hmm, not there.” He said in his low voice that contained an underline of mockery, you were sure. Though to him, it was simply amusing, to watch you that is. If anyone outside the two of your observing based gazes, he was actually sporting a noticeable smile. A small triangle smile, as if he was shy to make it any bigger, in hopes of hiding something.

You tried the two other chairs, the floor, leaning on a wall, but it was all a reject. You were embarrassed every time. Did you really have to go through all this just to get takeout pizza? You’d have to ask more later, that's for sure. So you tried for a last option, there was a tall stool right beside his, and well, three others far from him. So you tried the farthest tall stool from him, which was the far left. He shook his head no, you furrowed your eyebrows, you moved to the second stool, still no? Every move made your head wrinkle further down ‘till you reached the last seat, right next to him. To which he finally said, “Got it, pretty girl.” with a big boyish grin.

You didn’t have time to react to the nickname before finally letting out a sigh as you stretched your arms, and legs before laying your head on your arms that were resting on the table in front. That whole interaction probably took at least half an hour, you didn’t really know, you didn’t have a watch. “Pretty, my ass.”

He hummed, resting his head on his arms as well, though he was facing you. “Yer ass is.”

“The fuck.”

“Ya got a bad mouth.”

You groaned, and buried your face in your arms. Wanting to escape this. But you were lying to yourself if you said that you didn’t subconsciously enjoy his attention. You weren’t used to it, you weren’t supposed to feel this, right? It wasn’t, it just, it’s not you. Right? You shook your head to which the boy watched you do, getting your head up, posture straight and looking at him. He looked back, like he always seems to do.

“What do you want from me?” You say.

Osamu kept his mouth shut, still looking into you, thinking of what to say. Unwilling himself to tell you what he’d rather. So he asked a question, “D’ya cook?”

“Yeah, I make my own lunch and snacks.” You said, wary. Already feeling suspicious, you raise both your brows.

“Let’s cook.” He suggests.

Here’s the thing, you can’t do anything right if someone’s watching you too intently. It feels awkward, who in their right mind is able to do this right when he’s gripping your wrist that was stirring the batter for what the both of you decided to make, muffins.

“Ya gotta put in the right amount of strength.” He instructed.

“I’m starting to regret mentioning that I don’t bake often.” You thought, you thought you just thought that it was only in your thoughts. Oh no, you were becoming redundant, was it always this hot?

“Yer burnin’ figuratively, and literally. By that, your eyeballs are wide as fuck.” Osamu pointed out, he was biting his lip, to keep from a wide smile. “Tryna bake with yer hot gaze?”

What? “Huh.”

Now Osamu had wide eyes, I think it came off more sultry than intended. So he moved away from you as if you were burning his skin, though technically, you really were. Playing it cool. “What?”

“My what.”

“Yer… What?”

You were staring at him with a confused expression, about to open your mouth when, “Hey scrub! Make me a snack, I’m starvin’ over here.” Atsumu yelled from the room, you heard Kori’s small laugh and a faint, “Don’t be so mean, ‘Tsum.”

“Right. Let’s put ‘em in the tray then straight to the oven, yeah?” Osamu started, standing next to you, his face was not quite visible due to his wide shoulders, if you knew better, he might be obstructing your vision to not see the steaming heat from his ears. Spoiler, you did. But you chose not to poke at a sleeping bear.

“You sick? Got red ears?” You poked at a sleeping bear.

Actually, you were expecting a snark reply, it was easier that way. Just be sarcastic back. It was when the both of you were done, and placed the tray containing the muffin batter in the oven to bake, did Osamu dip his index finger in the bowl of slightly empty batter, facing you, and licking it off his finger. You really tried, you did; you tried not to look at the way he did that so unabashed. Dipping the same finger on the last remaining batter before menacingly leaning closer to you, inches from your face. If you could measure it exactly, 2.8 inches? So close.

Your weight moved from the heel of your foot to the front, again and again, what was he doing?

“What are you—?” You began before you got cut off by his finger wiping the batter on your lips, it made it look like you had a mustache. You stood there surprised for a few seconds, not knowing how to react, and hated how you expected something so different. It was until you heard a click of a camera and a low chuckle vibrate from the boy in front of you that you took the few remaining flour that was right in your reach to throw it in front of his face, making a huge fog of flour. He coughed for a bit, his eyes were glistening as he took the bowl next to him, using his whole hand to wipe leftover batter, getting ready to chase you.

You noticed. So you ran, but not without screaming, the leftover flour bag in your hand.

“No, please,”

“You asked for it, pretty girl.” He replied breathily, both of you were circling the kitchen island.

It took a good ten minutes before he decided to jump the island, and ran to quickly get hold of you with both of his arms, his hair tickling the side of your neck which made you laugh too hard, flour was all over his hair and apron, you failed to notice the handprint of batter right on your chest because you were struggling so hard to get off his grip. He was laughing too, you put on your scowling face, though not really mad, to face him, who in turn faced you as well. You didn’t notice the distance between the two of you was nearly non-existent; I repeat, nearly.

“Hey ‘Samu! I’m starvin’ and I smell yer bakin way over in my room.” You heard quick footsteps down the stairs, which made you jump in your skin. But even with that speed, you were still caught. Because Atsumu had an unreadable expression, “This place is a mess! Did we interrupt too early, hm?” Kori taking a peek right behind Atsumu.

You heard a dry cough from the other twin, facing the other direction, you facing the other as well. None of you spoke in time, so you took it. “No, uh, we weren’t, nothing was happening.”

“The scene of the crime is proof!” Atsumu pushed, teasing, as he continued his way down next to Kori.

“Shut it ‘ya scrub.”

“Yer the scrub, scrub.” They started bickering, real easy like that, trying to beat each other up. You noticed Kori walking down the stairs as well, first with an expression you couldn’t quite place, as if she was thinking deeply. But when she noticed you looking, she quickly changed into a bright smile, even sporting a blush, ready to tell a story about what happened behind the closed doors of Atsumu’s bedroom.

The day ended quickly after that, Osamu forced Atsumu to help the both of you to clean the kitchen while Kori volunteered to. It continued on like that, Kori dragging you into one of her meetings with Atsumu, you complaining but coming anyway, and you end up stuck with Osamu as she goes to her rendezvous with Atsumu that at this point, you have no idea what they’re doing. You just tag along.

Right now, you were beside Osamu in the gym during their break from training. Near the door, his teammates a good few distance away as he sat on a bench with his usual posture. Slumped back, his arms arching, one behind you that you fail to think of anything. Just as a general position. You were voicing out a thought you had in a while, seriously.

“So I was balls deep into ghosts way back—”

He looked at you, disgusted. “GROSS,” Shoving you lightly, “God, please never, ever say ‘balls deep in ghosts’ to anyone ever again. I feel like washin’ my mouth having to repeat that.” He even added this mild shudder that was just an exaggeration.

“What? What’s wrong with it?”

“I don’t really want to think about anyone having sex with a ghost.”

“Huh, who said anything about ghost sex?”

“You did, Y/N! Just now!”

“I didn’t—Oh, holy shit. No. Oh no.”

“What?”

“Does ‘balls deep’ not mean you’re standing in, like, the shallow end of the pool, metaphorically. Like up to your balls or something.”

“No! Balls deep is—It’s…”

“Balls deep is…”

“Why are you two talking about balls?” Suna interjected, acting as if he was just hearing about your conversation now. He was actually listening since the start, noticing the short distance between the both of you, interest hiding behind his eyes. “Balls, as in, dick or something? That’s wild.”

“Suna, no!” You screeched.

Osamu was biting back a laugh. The team was watching the three of you converse, getting used to the sight of you with their teammate. Assuming other things up the clouds. Atsumu was watching his brother with hawk eyes, and so was the girl next to him, Kori, though she was looking at you. If Suna was being honest, he didn’t notice any form of chemistry between your friend and the piss haired twin. They were all smiles and bright, but they always looked like they were thinking of something different. Though he doesn’t know anything about it.

Practice ended. It’s been months, and your interactions with Osamu have gotten more laxed. Your thoughts about being nothing more than a side-character was starting to change, because with him, you felt that you were a number one choice. You felt that you were a main character. Osamu felt the same, being with you felt like time was moving too fast and he wanted to spend it more with you, he was becoming insatiable. With you, he didn’t feel second to his brother for once. Lingering touches, his hand forgetting to unhook from yours, and his arm slinking around your shoulders as he yawns and asks for one of your homemade snacks as he starts to make some after-school snacks to give back to you.

You were invading his mind as much as he was invading yours. Sitting next to you during lunch, asking what’s in your bento, vice versa. Why was everything sailing so smooth? It was like it was just him and you. You heard rumors from the Miya fans that they were thinking you were Osamu Miya’s girlfriend. Forgetting your inferiority, sometimes the universe was just cruel, so it had to humble you.

“Atsumu and I broke up.” Kori sobbed.

Not to you, but to Osamu. You gripped your bag’s strap tightly. You peeled your lip with your teeth until the middle bled, so you sucked in the pain. No, you were not the protagonist. You weren’t, you never will be, and you never are in the past, present, and future. So you sucked in a breath to collect yourself, seeing Osamu pat the girl to attempt and comfort her, badmouthing his brother. “Sorry,” Her first gripped his shirt tighter.

“Osamu, please. It’s—I always liked you. It was just you.”

She wasn’t a bad person. She wasn’t, but why? You wanted to hit her, that, or jump off a building and die. None of them noticed you yet, at least that’s what you thought, but the sobbing girl had already seen you before she started bawling, and the other twin was forced to give her a tight, but awkward hug.

“Yokori… I liked you.”

You were about to walk to them normally after licking your lips from the blood, wanting to appear as a third party, to not let this happen. It just can’t. but you were pulled back by your collar. Who—

“Atsumu?”

He put his index finger in front of his lips to silence you, “Shh.”

So you followed him confused, he held your hand away from the scene. Leading you to the gates, the school half-empty, their practice about to start in half an hour or so. “Atsumu, why?” You croaked.

He had his eyes widened a bit, why? Actually, why did he pull you from that scene? His other hand that didn’t hold yours, which you didn’t bother to remove with the energy seeping out of your body quickly; it was taking everything in you not to break down. It went to his nape, rubbing it in question to himself, why? It was just that, seeing you staring at a scene when he knew you liked his brother, at a scene too painful, for a best friend who was just trying to do their paper, he knew. So his arms safely wrapped around you as you stared dead into his eyes, looking at his features that resembled the other who had unknowingly captured your heart.

Your bleeding lip trembled, your eyes turned glossy of the tears held back, Atsumu looked at you, empathetic. He broke up with your best friend because he couldn’t see it happen, every time he saw you with his brother, that wasn’t what they both had. They were simply not meant to be, and he was fine, he just didn’t know, but he was glad that because of it, he found out that she liked his brother more than she did him. He’d be angry, he should be, for his sake, but he wasn’t angry for him, he was angry for you.

He hid your face into his chest instead. You didn’t sob, solely because you thought you didn’t deserve to. But you cried, you let your tears soak in, “You look like him too much.”

“Shhh, I know—” Sigh. “It’s okay. You don’t have to look at me.” He said, trying his best to comfort you, caressing your hair. As a pair of grey eyes watched the scene from a distance, unable to hear, but able to see. Maybe he saw too much as he grimaced.

Osamu tried his best not to punch his brother right in the jaw, or push him away so he could yell everything he’d kept cooped up inside before you came running along, turning monochrome into a saturated-vision of the world. His teeth were pressing down on each other hard enough, he thought it might break, and shatter, just like his heart did. Of course, you chose his brother. Everyone always does. Every time he thinks he’s got it all, it’s all swiped underneath by his twin. Everyone says that it wasn’t their talents, or skills in volleyball that was the greatest gift they had ever received in life. It was their twin. But right now, he just thinks he was a curse he had to always deal with.

He jolted as he felt a hand on his shoulder. It was Suna.

“Practice. Kita’s calling. Call your brother.” The ever-observant boy runs over as he scans the scene, and hisses as he sees you wrapped in his brother’s arms. Though he knew more than that, he had first-class seats to this theatrical after all. But he’d rather not be part of the act club, it wasn’t his forte.

“Yeah, yeah. Okay.” Osamu replied, briefly. A bit tense, still.

He looked back to Atsumu who had let you go, and you who were walking away already. On the way to your home, he was sure. But he can’t help but cringe, thinking of it as your way of walking away from him.

“Practice! ‘Sumu!” He yelled, devoid of anything.

You jolted, you were a bit far but he yelled really loud you could still hear it. This didn’t go unnoticed by him, but you were both overcome by swirling emotions that stopped both of you to do the bare minimum, smile and wave, no after-school snacks. Atsumu jogged towards them, not noticing his brother’s attempt at hiding his huge frown. Practice was hell for Osamu, he didn’t want to see his brother right now, not when he still thinks of your precious little form hugging his brother’s, not his.

When his brother accidentally served a ball hitting Osamu behind the head, it was more of a switch for his anger; his rage.

“Fucking hell.” He said, turning viciously towards his brother who was uttering lighthearted apologies. It wasn’t until he started stalking towards Atsumu did the team start watching them like hawks, Aran thinking it’s just another one of their silly fights. But that thought was cut off when Osamu suddenly launched a fist towards Atsumu. “Ya just get off on this, huh? Ya get off on giving me bullshit every time.”

“Woah, ‘Samu I said I was sorry. What the fuck.” Atsumu said, brows furrowed, voice starting to get scratchy at his brother’s tight grip on the collar of his shirt. His hand quickly gripped his brother’s wrist tied to his shirt, attempting to get it off him, starting to get riled up from getting hit out of nowhere. “What’s your fuckin’ problem?” He said, about to kick his brother off of him.

“You. You just took everything from me, ‘Sumu. You took them.”

Osamu breathed heavily as Kita instructed the team to peel the twins away from each other as this wasn’t one of their silly fights at all. It held other issues. The captain knew that practice wouldn’t be able to continue like this, so he made them do drills before allowing them to go home. Looking pointedly at the Miya’s. The two brothers did what they were told to, going off to do their drills, and getting ready to go home.

They were walking silently side-by-side, both faces covered with a frown, Atsumu’s face having a bruise by the jaw whilst Samu didn’t have a scratch, only because Atsumu was realizing where it all came from.

“Did ya see?”

“Fuck you.”

“Look— It’s not what ya think, ya idiot.” Atsumu started, Osamu raised his brow at his brother. “I don’t want to say anything. Figure things out yourself, scrub.” Then the blonde started walking faster, leaving his brother behind to ponder.

The next day came by, he tried calling you but it never got through. Did you block him? What did he do? Did you really get repulsed by him to avoid him to that extent? That involved his texts getting left unanswered. You didn’t come to school today, he asked Kori, who he had rejected yesterday, and who was supposed to know about you more than he did. Though he was aware that you often felt inferior to her, as he told you the same about his brother, it was a feeling that you two were all too familiar with.

“I don’t know where she is, I’m sorry. She’s not talking to me either.”

Osamu stayed quiet at that, he thought you just needed time. So he let it go, looking forward to talking to you the following days. But that was the problem, you weren’t there in the following days either. He knew where you lived but he didn’t want to impose as your family didn’t know him very well yet either. He stopped himself from visiting until it hit the second week of your absence. Where were you? Why have you disappeared as if you never existed in the first place? He was growing worried, he wanted you to exist. He loved existing when you were around. And he wanted to clear everything up after getting multiple clues from Suna, and his brother, obviously.

It was until the class of the second week you were gone, when Osamu promised to visit your house after school, did their teacher tell them news that tore Osamu in half.

“One of our students Y/N L/N has transferred schools. The administration just finished filing her transfer after her visit yesterday, she didn’t get to say goodbye as her family moved out the same day. That’s about it, the first class is Physics. Have a nice day ahead, students.”

His ears were ringing. You were gone. Gone like the liquid that slipped past his hold. Atsumu looked at his brother in pity, knowing how much he had lost at that time. And he’d be lying if he said he didn’t hear Osamu crying in the shower when they got home. Or when he tried to not get his snot on his pillows, sniffling in the night. His heart ached for his brother.

It’s been years since 2nd year in High School, and Osamu has just opened up Onigiri Miya. His brother had gone pro on Volleyball, and he couldn’t be more proud. He still finds himself thinking back to a few months of pure bliss in highschool, and he tried dating a fair share as well, in hopes that he’ll get what he had with you. He didn’t. So he dedicated himself to his work, and his passion: cooking. A few more years and his business was a success, to which was hell for the first few months, having no investors, and all. He was wiping down his counter, black cap on, his hair not having the same old bleached-grey hair. Instead, it was back to his natural dark hair.

“What is this place, really?”

“The name reminds me of someone from my highschool days. But I only heard about it now, is it really good?”

“Yeah, totally! We should bring our superiors here, and see if we get a few favors, hmm? The onigiri here is a star-choice.” Osamu sees someone turned around, laughing prettily, smiling all-wide, they were bright. Until the same eyes he used to look at in such a close distance, caught his own. His heart skipped two beats, or maybe skipped beating this whole time, maybe he died because god, did he finally send his angel back to him?

It was when you uttered his name under your breath, from the entrance that rang the bell prior to the conversation he overheard earlier did he confirm it. “Hey pretty girl,” he says, as he takes off his cap, ruffles his hair, chuckling deeply, and looking directly back at you; your heart spasms. “Where have you been?”

Bonus:

“Yeah, he was a real bitch when I first talked to him in high school.” You badmouthed him loudly from your table, which made him yell from the kitchen, “I was trying to see if you’ll take my hand and put the note there, okay!” Laughing, you didn’t notice him stalking behind you until he placed a kiss on your cheek. “Grumpy-ass.”

Living with 'Samu! ⁆ End Credits

#miya osamu #Miya #Osamu #Haikyuu #haikyuu x reader #Haikyuu!!#Inarizaki #miya atsumu #Atsumu #Osamu x Reader #Osamu x you #suna rintarou #Slow burn #Angst

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engie-ivy · 3 years

Text

Remus’ roommate is a self-absorbed, cheating, manipulative bastard who treats guys like crap. Unfortunately, Remus cannot risk being kicked out on the streets, so he doesn't interfere.

Not interfering becomes a whole lot more difficult, though, when Remus’ roommate starts dating Sirius Black, a handsome, kind and clever man who deserves so, so much better.

By the end of the night, Remus is all too aware this is the kind of guy he could easily break his heart over.

Sirius gives him a hug before he leaves. “I had a great time! It was great meeting you! I hope we’ll be seeing more of each other.”

“Yeah…” Remus replies, but he knows that he’d rather never see Sirius again than having to bear seeing him at his roommate's side.

(Tw for an unhealthy, manipulative relationship (not Wolfstar!), and some slight sexual coercion, though nothing happens)

He Doesn't Deserve You

Remus Lupin does not like his roommate.

Gary Andrews is a sad stereotype of a playboy. He’s constantly hooking up with guys, sleeping with them, and dumping them the moment he gets bored of them.

Of course, they’re young, and there’s nothing wrong with having casual hook-ups. Remus supposes Gary is rather good-looking, or at least would be considered conventionally attractive, though has too much of that ‘arrogant frat boy-look’ for Remus’ liking. The problem Remus has with Gary’s behaviour is that he often makes guys believe he genuinely likes them, and he’s definitely not honest about hooking up with other guys at the same time.

Remus would move out, he would, if he had another place to go. Remus didn’t have a lot of money, and he desperately wanted a place to live. Gary didn’t need more money, and he wanted a roommate. Gary’s father bought him his apartment, so he doesn’t have to pay anything himself. The only reason he wanted a roommate, was to fulfil his need for constant attention and have someone to brag to about his many conquests. Not that he really wants Remus’ opinion. Remus might as well put up a cardboard cut-out of himself, as Gary mostly just likes hearing the sound of his own voice. Gary had decided that Remus was perfect for his narcissistic needs. He’s not so awkward that he gets on his nerves, but he’s awkward enough to not be any competition. But Remus gets to live in a nice apartment for much less money than you would normally pay for such a place, so he puts up with it, even if Gary just conveniently assumes Remus will take care of all the household chores.

Gary had tried to sleep with Remus when he had just moved in, but Remus had put a quick stop to that. He doesn’t have a lot of self-esteem, but he doesn’t hate himself that much. Gary hadn’t really minded. Remus suspects he considers himself out of Remus’ league anyway, and had thought he was doing Remus a favour.

“Ugh!” Gary drops his phone on the couch with a dramatic gesture.

Remus, standing in the kitchen waiting his tea water to boil, gives him a questioning look.

“That Sirius guy keeps texting me,” Gary grumbles. “You know, like “Hi, how has your day been?’”

Remus arches an eyebrow. “Asking the guy he’s dating how his day has been, how dare he!”

“He’s so clingy,” Gary complains.

“So then ghost him,” Remus says flatly. “Like you usually do the moment a guy starts to annoy you.”

“Nah,” Gary says. “This guy is ridiculously hot. I’m talking model-like hot. Like you won’t even believe, Loopy.” Remus hates that Gary calls him Loopy, like he has told him many times, but as usual, Gary doesn’t listen when something’s not about him. “Plus, I haven’t shagged him yet,” Gary adds with a shrug. “So I guess I have to put up with it for at least a little while longer.”

Remus sighs as Gary picks his phone back up.

“The hot ones usually aren’t so needy, you know,” Gary says after a while. “Maybe it has something to do with that childhood trauma-thing with his parents he was going on about.”

“He’s from an abusive home?” Remus asks with concern. “That’s rough. I hope he’s okay now?”

“Hmm, what?” Gary glances up from his phone, where he was undoubtedly swiping on Tinder again.

“I hope he’s okay?”

“Who?”

“Sirius. You just said he experienced some sort of trauma in his youth.”

“Oh, that,” Gary makes a dismissive gesture with his hand. “Dunno. Wasn’t really listening. Can you believe he made me sit through that entire story and he still wouldn’t let me get in his pants?”

The kettle whistles.

Remus contemplates pouring the boiling water over Gary’s head instead. Worst case scenario he’ll end up in jail, he’ll never get a certificate of good conduct, and he can say goodbye to his lifelong dream of becoming a teacher. Best case scenario he’ll be out on the streets with nowhere to go. Outside, It has just started raining even harder and he can hear the ice cold wind blowing. He pours the water into his mug. It was a close call.

Keep Reading

#wolfstar #wolfstar fanfiction #wolfstar fic #marauders #marauders fanfiction #marauders fic #modern marauders #sirius black #remus lupin #remus x sirius #james potter

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jaeminscoffee · 4 years

Text

The midnight man | l.ty

Pairing- Lee Taeyong x reader

Mentions- Lee Donghyuck, Na Jaemin, Liu YangYang, Nakamoto Yuta, Seo Johnny, Kim Doyoung, Ten Lee, Lee Dong Wook.

Genre- Horror!au, angst, crack, part fluff.

Warning(s)- Evil entity!Taeyong, Manipulation, Major character death (lmao you'll actually punch yourself towards the end), sexual themes suggested, impulsive decision making, talks with religion.

Word count- 11.83k

Synopsis- 'Lust though pleasurable, innocent and vice, thee shall stay loyal to thy partner regardless of wants. To betray thy partner is to deceive thy people and hence the kingdom. Thou shall pay for thy soul shall remain wandering, driven by the desires but, shall not be able to feel the human love thou took for a grain of salt. And all who shall follow thy steps shall face the same wrath.'

@kpopscape

This story is pure work of fiction and therefore doesn't speak about the mentioned members' personality in real life. I, in no manner, am trying to encourage hate speech towards the members so please don't come at me. This story was written using a mix of a bunch of urban legends and few made up by myself and therefore it isn't going to be spoken about the same way as it is in google. I also worked really hard on this piece and it's by far, the longest story I've written so feedbacks would mean a lot!, also it could get a little boring since i took time to focus on the side characters too. Make sure not to repost my works and sign it off as your own because that's a little disheartening and mockful towards the writer. So all credits reversed to @jaeminscoffee 2020©®

If anyone here doesn't know the story behind the midnight game, then read on! Because I've described it throughout the story! Happy reading!

29/10, Thursday, 10:57PM

"We need to do something this halloween man, Y/n come on!"

Your friends all collectively whined as you constantly kept rejecting their proposal.

Halloween is bullshit. It's overhyped and in all honesty, childish. You'd rather prefer staying home than go house to house and make a fool out of your existence. Not to mention you were all past the age of trick or treating. And to add on top of that came all the sugar rush you'd all go through at the end of the day. "For the last time, Hyuck we're not dressing up like crewmates and going trick or treating. I've got other things to do for the love of god" you grunt, rubbing the scrunched up skin to soothe the pain at the temples. University has been acting up again and so has life. "If your 'other things to do' is binge watch high school musical then no, you have no other better things to do" Yangyang bites back.

"It's just, I don't feel like it anymore, alright? It feels too weird going out asking for candies when we're all literally 19 and above. It's time to up the notch." you say, plopping down.

When Haechan called for an emergency meeting in pure 'among us' style back at the guys' dorm, you'd expected it to be about something along the lines of having to console Jaemin or someone for having been stood up on a date. What you didn't expect was to have the boys prepare an entire presentation on who'd dress up as what character from among us and who'd be the impostor, do a little play and then say 'red is sus' and then ask for candies. What made it worse was that you thought they were just pulling a prank on you when in all reality, they were dead serious which made you go, 'oh, oh they aren't pretending to be stupid, they're just in their original form.'

"It won't be that bad, doll. It's a genius plan if you ask me" Jaemim chirped in on the conversation finally after looking back and forth between you, Donghyuck and Yangyang caught up in a meaningless fight. "I don't see how any of this is genius, Jaem. If this plan's anything, it's stupid." You pull out your phone after making your way all the way to the headboard of Jaemin's bed. "How about we try out one of these creepy pasta games?" Yuta finally spoke up. Jaemin's brother, an early graduate, senior and of course a dear friend of yours. Yuta, despite the age difference between your classmates and you, had little to no trouble blending in with the tiny group of yours. Probably the only one who didn't behave like a toddler and the most sane one according to you. Yuta's been an amazing planner since junior year where you first met Jaemin, Yangyang and Donghyuck who then proceeded to introduce you to their senior friend group that consists of Yuta, Johnny, Doyoung; Donghyuck's cousin and Ten. You guys had a friendship the entire campus was envious of. But two year after you getting into the university, the seniors had to graduate. But that didn't stop all your bonds from staying as strong as ever. Not even after Ten got his posting in a town a little far away from the one you guys lived in. The distance didn't change anything between you guys and you were as close as you could ever get.

"Creepypasta?" Donghyuck inquired, looking straight at the guy who aimlessly scrolled down the screen of his device as Yuta didn't even bother looking up while passing the confused boy a nod. Sitting up cross legged from his previous side sitting posture, Yuta showed his phone screen to Donghyuck, who immediately got surrounded by the other two while you stare at the oldest in the room, slightly intrigued by the idea. "Creepypasta's like these horror-related legends that have been copied and pasted around the Internet by people who're too bored for their own sake." you explain as Haechan took the phone out of Yuta's hand who agreed to your explanation. "I read some sick games that I kinda wanna try out and see for myself," he said, looking at you with expectations and then the rest who seemed too immersed in surfing the website.

"Yuta, you of all people should know better than to think all these made up crap's real" you say nonchalantly.

Yuta's a huge skeptic, and so were you. Which is why you got along really well despite the mentioned age gap. The night gatherings back at the boy's dormitory or the girls (in this case, girl, yours) would always end up in narration of on spot made up stories of all genre, mostly horror because apparently according to Jaemin 'Rom-com's overhyped, sci-fi won't be fun when you narrate it out loud, mystery can easily turn boring, comedy, meh i guess, but a good horror story narrated properly, -yes, like you, Haechan- while adding jumpscares here and there could actually result in y'all being too scared to use the bathroom on your own'. And yeah, you'd startle here and there but the stories weren't believable enough for you to actually be scared. On the other hand, Haechan and Jaemin were scaredy cats. Literal toddler's who're so gullible, you could literally tell them there was an alien invasion news flash two minutes ago and they'd be hiding under their bed. And then there's Yangyang, he just doesn't care. He goes along with the plans solely for the fun of it and for the other's' (Haechan and Jaemin) reaction. "That's the point. I don't" he shuffled around to shift closer to you,

"Which is exactly why i want to try them out"

Maybe it's the feline that crossed over his body, maybe it was the fact that his spirit just wasn't ready to leave the human realm yet. Maybe it's the mourning of his family or maybe it's him himself knowing full too well his potential was truly wasted due to the fast departure. Whatever it was, his spirit was definitely made restless.

The world is a cruel place where harsh actions are always sugar coated by honey like words. It's how he knew the doings of his people were wrong that made him disappointed. The practices of the people, his people, were stupid, meaningless and only harmful to the human kind. They fend off the satisfaction of their almighty even if that means that there needs to be sacrification of their loved ones, their nemesis, or them themselves. And it was his ancestors fault for starting all these practices.

Passed down generations from generations was the curse put on the first of their bloodline by the princess he'd defied to go out and be ruthless by disregarding his duties as a husband, a father, a member of the royal courts and as a human being.

Lee Dong Wook. The root of all evil, the main reason the males of the family line faced the same wrath as him, all cursing at him but one namely enjoying his role. The pagans, dating back to the roman times era had a very, let's say, interesting method of punishing. The said lords they'd worship, the people following the religions had a strong belief that nature is sacred and that the natural cycles of birth, growth and death observed in the world around us carry profoundly spiritual meanings. Gods and goddesses of life, or say, death or anything else that exists beyond life and death, they believed in all.

The doings of his ancestors started off innocent. Sacrifices to the lords of goodness and tranquility, a peaceful life by the towns and outskirts, forgiveness for wrong doings and of course, happiness. It's how any religious rituals would go about and all were happy until the said betrayer of the group came in with that curse of his. 'The doings of his shall be repented for all the men following shall be the one paying it,'

At first glance when the man returned back to his royals, there were little to no suspicions of a curse being casted on him. He seemed normal to his family, his people except for the occasional forcing people to do something they despised. And it wasn't just the men of the family instead, it was all. But mostly the men, unless the same sin were to be committed by the females. Obscure behaviors have been asked to follow starting exactly at midnight to the witch's hour be it hurting your loved one, your enemy, doing sinful things, allowing self to get manipulated and mostly, shortening their own life time in the human realm. It was all unexplainable. Why was he asking people to do things like this but most of all, why are they even listening to him?

It wasn't until they discovered that Dong Wook, for one, was never the one who returned home. On a second note, he, 'Dong Wook' mainly only targeted the men whose doings were similar to his that was fueled by the same sin that had him going. Which only remained undiscovered. The curse was unbeknownst to all still, Dong Wook himself remained undiscovered. Or proposed by the elders of the community, his body remained undiscovered while his spirit roamed restless among the people.

The pagan romanticists are, in most cases, ignorant of the “paganism” they praise—the redeemed paganism of Christianity depicted in the transfigured water of the True Well of Life. Wrestling with the Greek gods, however, leads us to see the hyper-anthropomorphization of the gods with one intention in mind—justification of sexual lusts and displays of power over the weak.

The oldest written account of the Greek deities is from Hesiod. His Theogony, literally “birth of the gods,” charts out the genealogies of the major and minor deities in two branches. The first set of gods come into existence without sex. The second set of gods come into existence with sex; often very graphic and violent sex and they continue to have violent sex after their birth.

As Hesiod continues to describe the birth and death of the gods and great monsters of antiquity, the chaining of Prometheus to his eternal torment is described. So too is Hades’ rape of Persephone. Battle is depicted left and right, and “a terrible din arose from their dreadful wrath, and the work of power was revealed”. Lust, sex, and war reign supreme in Hesiod’s telling of the birth of the gods. Moreover, it is from this brutality and carnality that Hesiod gives them praise—only those with enough cunning and ambition are worthy of having the praise of the muses.

That the gods birthed through sexual lust are themselves lustful was not missed by Christians of the pagan community. Though St. Augustine received the Romanized version of the Greek myths, he goes to great lengths and laborious pains—using the pagans’ own prophecies —to highlight the moral depravity of the gods in Confessions and City of God.

His sin, after all the years, was lust and the want to dominate.

'Lust though pleasurable, innocent and vice, thee shall stay loyal to thy partner regardless of wants. To betray thy partner is to deceive thy people and hence the kingdom. Thou shall pay for thy soul shall remain wandering, driven by the desires but, shall not be able to feel the human love thou took for a grain of salt. And all who shall follow thy steps shall face the same wrath.'

Oh, how lust was a dangerous feeling.

29/10 continued. 11:28PM

It's how you all circled around in the living room like any other day that was comical to you. Instead of reading out your own made up story, it so happened to be the Creepypastas Yuta screenshotted for what he wanted to try out and see for himself. It wasn't even his idea to read them out. Haechan and Jaemin's 'too curious for their own sake' selves were the ones who wanted to read it out loud. "How about we sit in the order of who's gonna read out what and when?" Yangyang suggested, standing up from his seat. "Yuta read out the topics and we'll pick randomly."

"No fun! Hold up," Haechan did some pretty exaggerated hand actions before getting up and heading to his room, well, Jaemin's room to do who knows what. "Okay? I'll get the candles!" Yangyang said, him getting out of his seat too, "And I'll go get the bible, jesus christ" and Jaemin was out of his seat too. You look at Jaemin in a funny manner, as though questioning him with your eyes if he's actually going to get a bible or not, "What? I don't want to die young, I'm too hot for that" he said, before following Haechan's steps to his bedroom, "Yikes, you aren't going to die dude"

"Okayy, I'm back, make way bitches" Haechan dictated to which he earned a few groans and a smack on the ankle from Yuta, "Jaemin! I can't find the candles!" "It's beside the Reese's cups! Second rack inside of the refrigerator!" Jaemin says while walking back up to your tiny circle with an empyre comic in his hand and a cross pendant dangling off of his neck, "That's a bible?" you question. "Shush, do not question the power of avengers and fantastic four." Jaemin replies, holding the comic up close to his chest. You all collectively dismiss it with a concerned look directed towards the male, "Are we not going to question the fact that Jaemin keeps his candles inside the fridge?"

"So here's what we're going to do, I've got these tiny papers which have numbers from 1 to 5,because we're five people and I've folded the paper into chits, once i toss it, we pick random sheets and the number you get is when your turn to read is, any objections?" Haechan explained, "Even if you have any, keep it to yourself because I don't care" he bites in again while juggling the folded sheets in a closed palm while the other supports his body by it being planted behind him. "Okay I'm back with the candles" Yangyang finally joins in on the circle, completing it, "You took that long to find one candle?" Yuta asks, "No i was eating the reese's cups" he replied, wiping his hand on your jean clad thighs earning him a loud whine of 'Eww that's disgusting man' and a little too far from soft smacks on his shoulder, "You piece of sh-" Jaemin starts, "Okay all, Focus!" Haechan cuts him off, ready to throw the bits onto the space between the five of you in front of the now lit candle (Thank you, Yuta), and so he tossed it a little high up from the ground, letting the paper fall of his palms and onto the floor while being cautious of not throwing it anywhere near the flame.

"Now let's arrange ourselves according to the numbers, who's number one?" Haechan asks, Yuta raises his hands while pointing at where he's sitting, "I'm not getting up, y'all arrange yourself so that the person going second is to my right and the last person would be to my left", you all look at him nonchalantly, "What?" with a shake of your head, you proceed calling out numbers, "Number two?" Haechan shoves Yangyang back to take his place beside Yuta, "bitch." Yangyang seats himself beside Haechan, followed by Jaemin and lastly, you.

"First, Yuta!" Jaemin slurs the elders name, receiving a death glare from his cousin. Nevertheless, Yuta cleared up his throat and switched his attention to his phone screen, "The first urban legend is from Japan, ironically." He states as a matter of fact, "It's called Aka Manto."

"Aka manto is an urban legend related to toilets—particularly those in elementary schools.-"

"Is that why you take a relatively long time inside of the bathroom? Are you, you know? Tickling pickles with Aka Mant-ow! Sorry!" Yangyang was wasted as he was tackled onto the floor by Yuta, while the rest of you cracked up, "Now let's get a little serious, come onnn!" Haechan whines.

"This phenomenon is known all over Japan, with countless variations on the same theme. It usually takes place in a specific stall in a specific bathroom in the school. Usually it is an older or seldom used bathroom, often in a stall with an older style squat toilet. Often the fourth stall is the cursed one, as the number four is associated with death." "I'm so glad our university has only two stalls," Jaemin chimes in, suddenly grasping the cross pendant.

"Most stories follow this general pattern: while at school late in the evening, a student suddenly finds him or herself in desperate need of a toilet. The closest restroom available is one that is normally avoided by the students; it is older and less well-kept, separated from the rest of the school, and is rumored to be haunted. But with no time to search for a different restroom, the student enters. He or she does their business, and when they have finished, they reach for the toilet paper only to find that there is none. Then they hear a strange voice" Yuta looks up from the phone screen, "“Do you want red paper? Or blue paper?”"

"None bitch, give me the classic white,"

With a roll of his eyes, Yuta continues, "If the student answers, Red paper, moments later, they're stabbed and sliced up violently that blood seeps out of them, painting the walls of the stall red and it soaks up into their body, making them appear red", "And if the student responds blue paper, then their blood is going to be sucked up dry, leaving them dead and blue-faced on the floor."

"But! If you try to outsmart Aka Manto, by replying to question with, i don't know, "Yellow paper" then too, dead is inevitable, you will be shoved onto the floor where the spirit is said hold your head down in the dirty toilet water until you drown and well, die" Yuta ends with a shrug of his shoulder, "Seems pretty bullshit to me" and you agree alongside, though, it could be a little creepy if the existing legend did turn out to be true. "Okay next!"

Yuta leans back a little more, pressing onto your side which you took as an invitation to lean on his shoulder. When you did so, all Yuta did was beam at you and wrap his arms around you to keep you close after handing the phone over to Haechan, "If you want me to start reading you have to give it up for me. Give me the grand welcome that i deserve" the lad said in a childish voice which again only earned him a few smacks and half hearted applauds. "So this one is apparently called, the one man hide and seek" though all narrations were being taken on a lighter note, the mood set in the room gave you enough space to picture the stories, added to that came the factor that Donghyuck knows exactly how to narrate what.

"The "One-Man Hide and Seek", also known as the "One-Man Tag," is a ritual for contacting the dead. The spirits, which are wandering restless on the Earth, are always looking for bodies to possess. In this ritual, you will summon such a spirit, by offering it a doll instead of a human body." He lowers his voice while focusing solely on the screen.

"The warnings say that if you have any psychic abilities, you may feel unwell or be prone to accidents during the ritual." He raises his eyebrows, looking at all four of you in a curious manner. The things you need for this game seems lowkey sketch"

"One stuffed doll. It must have limbs, Rice, enough to stuff the doll full. One needle, and one crimson thread. One pair of nail clippers. One sharp-edged tool, such as a knife, glass shard, or scissors. One cup of salt water. Natural salt would be best. A bathroom, with a bathtub and some form of counter. A hiding place, preferably a room purified by incense and ofuda. There must be a TV in there." Haechan's face contorts with each requirement for the game. Letting out a defeated sigh, he hands the phone over to Yangyang, "Of all the stories i could've narrated, i got chosen for this and for what? Just to contact stupid poltergeists. Just play a ouija board and go"

Giving Haechan a sympathetic pat on the back, he takes the device. Looking through the screen he cracks up a smile, "Alright, listen up closely. This is an Urban legend classic"

"The Slender Man-" a bunch of 'aahhs' of realization resonate through the room

"-is a supernatural creature that is described as appearing as a normal human being but he is described as being 8 feet tall and he has vectors or extra appendages that are described to be as sharp as swords. The creature is known to stalk humans and cause many disappearances. He is described as a shadow creature that has a missing face. The creature fits into many mythologies in legends from nations such as germany and celts which brings up the possibility that he could be real." Yangyang pauses to add in a little more life to his reading while all of your paid full concentration to him

"A man named victor Surge found this legend and made his own version of it which he called slender man. The slender man is not exactly evil according to mythology but victor Surge’s version shows him as an evil creature that stalks humans to kill. In mythology he was actually trying to save you from a painful death by taking you to the underworld early." he ends, placing the phone down in front of him, screen down. "Kills you to save you from a death and collectively shortens your lifespan? Seems legit to me" Jaemin chimes in while the rest of you chuckle whereas Haechan pouted at the device in front of his friend, "I should've gotten that story"

"My turn!"

"So, ahem-" Once the focus is all on him,Jaemin looks down onto the device containing his part of narration. "- This is an urban legend about a girl named Daruma who was a young Japanese woman that died in the bathroom, which upon entering to take a bath, it stumbled and her forehead ended up against the edge of the tube, destroying it the brain, at the same time that her eye embedded in the tube , leaving it in consequence, one-eyed key and later , dead by bleed out." "Oh god ouch" You hiss as though your forehead was the one that hit the edge, " Her appearance as described is apparently; black hair that is entangled, her clothes rotting and made shreds. She only has one eye. Her left eye is completely open and injected with blood." "That's gruesome," Yangyang adds, earning a nod from Jaemin who's eyes were still fixated on the screen. "And apparently there's a ritual that you can follow to summon her into your house for twenty four hours straight" At the silence, he continues. "I'll shorten it, so you have to begin it right before your bedtime, shed all your clothing and enter your bathroom, turn off all the lights and fill in your bathtub, climb into it while being seated facing faucet, close your eyes and start washing your hair while chanting "Daruma-san fell down" and keep chanting that until you're done washing your hair, and yeah don't open your eyes."

"If you did it right then you'll get this image of a japanese who'll slip and fall in front of you. Even if you hear a noise behind you, do not open your eyes, no matter what it takes, Ask out loud, 'why did you fall in the bathtub' and let that hang in the air. With your eyes still closed, get up and out of the tub and be careful not to slip and do not drain the tub. Go to your room, don't turn the lights on, shut the bathroom door closed and sleep. Wake up the next day and carry on with your day and you'll apparently feel her presence alongside you all day. She'll constantly try getting close to you, when she does, scream 'Tomare!',"

"That means stop," Yuta adds to which you all hum in understanding.

"To end the game, capture her gaze from over your shoulder and say 'Kitta' which means 'I cut you loose' while swinging your arm in a chopping motion. If you followed the procedures then you'll be rewarded but if not then, run. That's all it says here" He stops, looking a little shaken at how he created an image of it all in his mind. "They didn't say how to get rid of her if you fail following the procedure?" you ask

"No." Jaemin shrugs it off

"Alright boys, my turn"

30th October, Friday, 10:53PM

It's probably how you read out your part of story telling, or it was how he felt the game was a little too unrealistic that had Yuta hooked onto the urban legend.

Yuta found himself at his dorm doing a little more research on the midnight ritual. A backpack already consisting of all the elements required for the game, 'could it really be played just by one person?'. Whatever it was, he really wanted to do the game. He wanted someone to accompany him, of course. But knowing his friend group, not many would be ready to play it alongside. Doyoung was probably busy preparing his resumes for his job interviews. Johnny's all the way back in Chicago for a little family time. Ten was a little too far from your town so he'd feel bad calling him all the way over just to perform a probably demonic ritual. Donghyuck and Jaemin are out of the question, they'd obviously say no. Yangyang has a company party to attend as the heir. And you had to study for your test on Monday so he didn't really feel like disturbing you though, he did inform you that he was going out to have some fun and that you could join him anytime. Closing his laptop with a sigh, he gets up and walks over to where his bag was sprawled across the floor, picks it up and makes his way out of the studio apartment like dormitory after grabbing his car keys.

Not like he believed it was real, it's incase if the legend turns out to be even the slightest of reality, he wasn't going to get his dormitory haunted, instead opting to perform it at the house he grew up in, his childhood house. That was left abandoned ever since they moved out months before his younger brother was born after his father had an episode still unknown to him inside the place. It was convenient enough to perform the ritual in and no one lives there anymore, and it was just a few minutes from where his house was anyways.

Reaching the place and swinging the backpack over his shoulder, he makes his way into the surprisingly still intact house. Not much time to waste, looking around, Yuta slowly made his way up the wooden stairs, the wood creaking with each step he took to prove the existence of this house dated long back. The guest room shut lock from lack of human souls even when they used to live there. The paintings still hung off of a single screw, nostalgia hitting him straight as he recalled the one time he was playing catch with a neighbor's kid and ended up breaking the glass frame. The wallpaper's adhesive seemingly had gotten weaker from how they had started coming out from nooks and crannies of the walls. The place, without doubt, looked a little creepy but nonetheless felt homely.

Switching on all switches from the main controller that was in the control room right by the end of the hallway, the entire darkness was replaced with light as the bulbs shockingly still seemed to function. The warm white colour of the lights took Yuta all the way back to his growing up years, missing all the fun he'd had there and all the memories he'd created. He, though grew up mostly by himself from how busy his parents were on the weekdays and sometimes the weekends, missed them more now that they live far off in Japan with his mother's family. Especially now that he was in the place they spent the most time together in. Shaking his head, he had no trouble navigating his way to his childhood room. Where he set the bag down.

He reached out to his back pocket to get out his phone, switching it on as the screen illuminated, 11:28PM, the screen read. To kill the time, Yuta set up all the items required in place to proceed the ritual smoothly. He pulled his laptop out of the backpack once he was all set to maybe watch something on the internet. It being other peoples attempt at the ritual he was about to perform.

11:55PM.

Yuta inhaled, having only a few more minutes until he had to proceed. He recalled your words,

"Alright boys, my turn" You snatch the phone out of Jaemin's hand who seemed really immersed in finding out more about the legend he just read out about, earning a pout from him. "I was reading" he let out in a whiny tone immediately going stoic after receiving a 'do i care' look from your end. "Okay, so the story I'm going to read out is called the midnight man, or the midnight game" You scroll back and forth through the pages the oldest of the group screenshotted. "From what he's gathered, there's not much backstory, but apparently it's a ritual or mostly a punishment that the pagan's use to punish the betrayer of the group who failed to stay loyal to their lords or the group. One of the people of the religion will summon the midnight man to an abandoned house where they lock up the said betrayer who'll then be put through god knows what by the midnight stranger," You stop to look up from the screen to look at each of your friends before letting out a sigh.

"My take on this though is that it's highly impossible since the rules here state that once you start the ritual you aren't allowed the leave the place until the game is completely done unless you want the midnight man to follow you around for as long as you live, so unless the midnight man actually favored the pagans, there's no way they could punish the betrayer without one of the loyal ones passing away along with the one being punished" you state, "But what if, it's the midnight man that they preach? You know, like, they could be praying the midnight man" Haechan adds in a point which seemed to make sense, "That's possible too"

"Why would someone preach an evil entity? That's so sketch" Jaemin asks perplexed. "They did a lot of sketchy things back in the days, Jaem. I wouldn't question it," Yuta chirps. "Is there any other backstory given about the midnight man?" Yangyang finally speaks up, "Well not really, but when i was taking screenshots of this it apparently started with a curse on someone whose identity is unknown to most. There was no such thing as the midnight game or ritual until the said bewitched man came back into town. I only know up to there, but there are high chances that he's probably the origin of the ritual." Yuta explains. "Why does Y/n get the best always, that's so unfair" Haechan's dramatic self whines while leaning onto Yangyang who rolled his eyes but nonetheless threw his hands around the latter's shoulder, "Anyways, the procedure for the ritual is given here."

"You need one candle, a lighter or a match box or anything that ignites fire, a piece of paper, something to write with, a sharp object, it could be a pin, it just needs to be something sharp enough to draw blood, a wooden door, and salt for protection-" You read out, "Now why the fuck would they need blood," Jaemin asks, shaken up. "That's for them to know and us to find out"

"Here's how the invitation for the midnight man goes. Begin prior to midnight,"

Yuta stood up from his bed, and walked up to the backpack on the floor, picking out the papers he'd brought along and took out a blunt pencil.

"Write your full name- first, middle, and last- on the piece of paper with your writing implement." He wrote syllable by syllable, Nakamoto Yuta. "Prick your finger with the pin and squeeze until a drop of blood appears. Dot the blood on the paper and allow it to soak in. Turn off every light in your home." He took out the small safety pin he brought along from his jean pocket, pressing his fingers hard and pricked into the skin as hard as he could, keeping in mind to not draw too much blood. Yuta let the droplet fall right in the space between his last name and first.

"Place the paper with your name and blood on it in front of the closed wooden door. Light the candle using the matches or lighter and place it on top of the paper. If you are using a taper, make sure it is placed in a candle holder." He walks up to the door and places down the paper with his name and blood on it, with the half melted scented candle he brought along. Yuta took out his phone once again, 11:59. "Knock on the door 22 times. The final knock must occur precisely when the clock chimes 12am. Open the door; then blow out the candle and close the door. Relight your candle immediately." He starts to knock on the door, drumming on the dusty wood, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22.

He checks the time once again, 12:00AM.

He leans down to pick the glass jar containing the candle, relighting it,

"I welcome you."

Taeyong loved the tiny creatures in the human realm. They were so naive and so, stupid but weirdly smart at the same time that made playing with them ten times more interesting. The callings from them, or the way they say it in the human realm, summoning the spirit was the only way he could gain access to enter the place. Summoning wasn't even necessary. Saying his name out was more than enough for him to go up to you. Midnight man, midnight stranger, midnight visitor, pagan's god, What not had the human's named him.

The only one besides his ancestor of said curse that enjoyed the power of punishing people was Taeyong himself. The youngest of the bloodline and the freshest of pagan's spirit, he loved the power he had. Sure he had no access to love, instead besides lust and range he felt nothing, maybe amusement too, but none other than that and he seemed perfectly fine with that. Human's always seeked lust more than love either way so he found no problem in being void of feeling a vulnerable emotion. Instead, he found love pathetic. Watching human's from where he lived, he'd seen all from men and women seeking love by going to heights of trouble only to waste away your remaining life with one partner. Leeching off of pleasure at times when you had a significant other. He always got a hearty laugh from all of that. According to him, if you want someone, get them. Instead of tailing them and trying to be a goody two shoes, just make them yours in a way that's inevitable for them to fall for you. Control how they feel. Easier said than done since he was the only one with the ability to do so, 'how fucking pitiful'.

So when he saw you and your small group of friends discussing about him, laughing at all the assumptions you made along the way, he wanted each of you to himself. "My take on this though is that it's highly impossible since the rules here state that once you start the ritual you aren't allowed to the leave the place until the game is completely done unless you want the midnight man to follow you around for as long as you live, so unless the midnight man actually favored the pagans, there's no way they could punish the betrayer without one of the loyal ones passing away along with the one being punished" you're smart and that was intriguing to him. He liked the way you thought of things and the male beside you too, you both seemed to take tales of him as a grain of salt and that, besides angering him, made him feel the want to prove himself to you. Taeyong found the other three cute, seemingly scared of him just the way he liked it.

His ancestor's who held the same power as him, the curse actually, came to be known as said lord because of their power of manipulation and to inject in their worst nightmare into their minds that had the people divide themselves into groups. One that believed the power they had was for the good and considered them to be their god, their savior. And the other being the one's scared of their power and the fear that the same faith would bestow upon them that had them pray for forgiveness for sins they never committed. So your friend had the point a little, but it was inaccurate. They believed him. Believed Taeyong and feared his power. He loved people bowing down in front of him, eyes trembling and body shivering. It gave him a sense of dictatorship. And he had set his mind to have both of you non-believers fear him.

Having been brought up with little to no love, Taeyong followed down the same path as his great grandfather. Not having enough time to feel the vulnerable emotion, he chose to go down the path of pleasure and power play. His powers though, seemingly stronger than the past generations, probably due to the fact that he was young, ruthless and free of care. He could make himself appear physically in the human realm in any shape and form, though he always preferred to go in his original, but less scarier form. His visuals were out of the world. He didn't have to scare people to make them obey, instead all he had to do was pretend to be there and just be himself and that only made humans seem even pathetic to him.

"Relight your candle immediately"

12:01PM, The main event.

"Keeping your candle in hand and your salt and matches or lighter close by, begin to move about your home. Should your candle go out, you must relight it within the next ten seconds. If you are successful, continue moving about your home. Do not stop moving until 3:33 am. If you are unsuccessful in relighting the candle, immediately surround yourself with a circle of salt. Remain inside the circle until 3:33 am. At 3:33 am, it is safe to stop moving or to step outside your circle of salt. You may also turn on the lights. The game Is Over."* You conclude. Hissing slightly at the sudden pain by your shoulder that was exposed from the minimalistic clothing you'd adorned, the stranger looking over it all smirked to himself. 'Got it'

Yuta opened the door again, mindful to keep his phone back in his jean pocket along with the lighter and of course, the salt be brought along. Starting from the end of the hallway, nothing seemed to change except now, the eerie silence was starting to bother him, 'Just 3 hours to go,'. He didn't miss a single corner, walking room to room, corner to corner, mindful to stay inside all the way. The temperature of certain rooms seemingly lesser than others. A cold pocket.

"There are few warnings too," you swipe the image to go to the next one, "At 3:33 am, the Midnight Man will leave your home. After he has left, you may safely end the game. Do NOT turn on any lights during the game. Do NOT use a flashlight during the game. Do NOT go to sleep during the game. Do NOT use a lighter instead of a candle during the game." Check. He had a lighter on him just to relight the candle anyways.

Taeyong, following the guy seemed to be quite impressed by his bravery. Not even the slightest of shaken up as he proceeded to walk about the villa. That's good, no slip ups and he seemed too good to mess anything up either ways, and that bored the entity. Where's the fun if he just succeeded?

To avoid the candle from going off at the sudden flickering, Yuta covered it up the best he could with his hands and checked around whether any windows were left open. Darkness engulfed the surrounding all of a sudden, the lad being taken aback, 10 seconds. He rushed to take out his lighter, 9, pressing the button repeatedly to ignite the flame only to get a small blue flame instead, huh? 8, running back full speed happy that he was in the premises of where his backpack is, he pulled the spare lighter, a brand new one out of the side pocket, 7, repeating the same process of flicking the button over and over, 6 until a bright orange flame engulfed the dark room, 5, he immediately grabbed his candle from besides the bag, 4 reaching in close by the wick, burning himself slightly in 3-, the process. Yuta heaves out a sigh of relief, while the spirit laughs at the frantic boy. 'He's cute.'

For a breaker, he took out his phone, looking at the time that seemed to pass by quickly throughout the ritual, 2:47 AM. A little more while to go until he'd finally get it over with. "Do not attempt to provoke the Midnight Man during the game." You ended for the nth time that night, "Which idiot would-" Yangyang asks "Haechan-" Jaemin pretends to cough while blurting out his best friends name, the mentioned feigning offence while tilting his head to the side, tongue poking at the insides of his cheek. "Seems like that's pretty much it." you shrug while the older guy beside you leaning back on both of his hands, "I kinda wanna try that out" Yuta raised his eyebrows at you. "Halloween night? We all go together" you chirp in, both of you whipping your heads to look at the three perplexed boys. "Uh, I have to water my fish on halloween? She'd get pretty thirsty". Jaemin's eyes wandered about, coming up with an excuse, "And I gotta walk my rock yo, physical fitness." Haechan adds, "Can I bring my fish along? She could use some exercising".

"Come on guys, it won't be that bad, we'll stick in a group?" You pleaded, trying your best to muster up the cutest puppy eyes. "I'm down" Yangyang shrugs. You do a tiny seal clap, looking expectedly at the other two, Yangyang and Yuta doing the same. "We stick together?" Haechan asks, to which the three of you nod your head,

"Alright then we're down too"

[3:04AM 30th, October. ]

A few more minutes left until he'd succeed, Yuta was starting to grow tired of constantly roaming. He'd usually not the one to wear out that quickly, but for a reason unknown to him, he felt utterly sleepy, tired, hungry and just wanted to lie down. He decided to take a small break, the candle still light, dangerously flickering but yet still intact. Yuta sat by the foot of the stairs as Taeyong looked at him with the same cocky smirk on his face, contemplating whether to pop out or not. 'Maybe let's make it subtle? '

Taking up the form of a black humanoid figure, Taeyong makes his way towards Yuta whose eyes seem to be dropping low with each passing second. Upon hearing the sounds of footsteps Yuta looks up, a hand on his forehead from the sudden throbbing headache. Letting out a loud yell at the figure in front of him that disappeared almost immediately, he rushed to grab his lighter again. The sudden temperature drop made him shudder. Taking out the new lighter, he pressed the button again and again as the time limit started to exhaust, 6, at a successful fire, he reached for his candle, only for the flame to go off when it neared the candle wick. "what the fuck.." 5, "come on.." he stated in a rushed voice, sure that he just saw whatever he saw once again. Finally flicking the button one last time, he succeeded in lighting the candle.

Contrary to popular belief, the midnight man didn't always radiate death. Sometimes he just messes around with the humans because the underworld could get a little boring. And as the curse states death and wrath is only to be faced by those who sinned and the boy playing right now seemed to be of no threat. All Taeyong wanted to do was get the guy to believe in his existence. Skeptics were like an insult to him. So if he had to prove himself and his existence on his own, then so be it. He gets some pretty good experience out of it anyways.

Yuta stood up immediately, remembering the warning's you'd stated, "Do not stop moving until 3:33am", walking back up the stairs, he took out his phone to check the time, 3:29am. Almost.

The same sounds of footsteps resonated from behind him, Yuta took an immediate U-turn. Going back down the stairs and roaming the empty, dark hallways, making sure to enter each and every room, keeping a mental note to thank his parents for having a slightly confusing infrastructure. The wax was almost completely out in the glass jar, but he had to hang in there for a little longer than 2 more minutes when he felt something brush his shoulder, much similar to how a friend would drape their hands over his/her friends' shoulder. He could've brushed it off as anything if it weren't for the sharp pain he felt right after the feeling of someone touching him. He's getting the proof he wants. Almost as if someone pulled his hoodie, Yuta stumbled back, letting out a shaky scream, tripping on his own foot, landing butt down onto the floor, catching a glimpse of the same humanoid figure he'd been seeing. He needs to get out of there.

Stumbling back onto his feet, Yuta bolted it upstairs, grabbing his phone once again to check the time, 3:32am. Reaching his room, he set the candle down right beside him, vary of the windows and doors, starting to back his backpack, the sounds of rushed footsteps running start to where he is ringing through his ears, hands shakingly packing his bag. Keeping the candle closeby, contemplating whether to draw a salt circle or not since there was only less than half a minute left when the same humanoid figure neared him with fast footsteps, reaching by the door frame with a loud agonizing scream only to disappear immediately.

Not realising the stress of tears flowing and the tresses sticking to his forehead, Yuta looked at the door frame in a perplexed yet confused manner. What the fuck was that.

Taking out his phone once again while grabbing his backpack, laptop and the car keys in the other hand, 3:34 am. He'd made it through. After reaching the front door, not even bothering to close it, he rushed to his car, starting it before pulling up your contacts, seeing the messages he'd never sent you.

Yuta san 1:39am: The boys said they won't make it tomorrow, it's gonna be just you and i

Y/nleE 1:43am: Why not?

Yuta san 1:45am: Dk, they said they aren't interested. So come near xxxx tomorrow at 11:30. I'll meet you there.

Y/nleE 1:48am: Coolsies.

Yuta san 3:38am: Y/n don't come here, gather the boys and meet me by Haechan's dorm tomorrow. The game's no fucking joke.

And with that he started driving away quickly to his dormitory, not once looking back at the house to see a human. Or a human like figure standing there, A bright red hair standing out due to his blood drained looking pale skin. A smirk on his face

Message not delivered.

31st October, 22:37PM, 2020.

Today was a weird day,

Having all plan's set two days before, you'd make sure to keep yourself ready for whatever you and your friend group were supposed to do today. You finished up all your assignments earlier that day to keep yourself free from afternoon and on.

The weird part was that, no matter how much you kept your phone for charge, each time you tried calling one of the guys to ask for the sudden bailing out on plan, which is a shocker because they've never done that, your phone kept switching off. You could've gone all the way to their apartment, well, dorm, but you decided to wait until later to do so. Maybe a few minutes before leaving to the place Yuta texted you so that they'd have no choice but to come along. Since your last time texting with Yuta, you hadn't heard from him. Granted, he did text you quite late at night saying he's going to do god knows what and to tell you of the sudden plan change, but you hadn't heard from him after, that being weird since he literally lives a floor below yours, he could've come any moment but nope. You kept a mental note to tell him off later.

You took out your phone once again to check if they'd sent any messages or missed calls only to have an empty chat box, other than that of your other friends that is. Added on top of that came the constant pricking feeling on your shoulder blades from the last day you hung out with the boys. The pain would appear randomly and it would be hurtful enough to draw blood, which is weird considering the fact that you kept yourself away from all sharp objects and had a full sleeve covering the area.

One stone, two birds. Taeyong's motto.

After having interfered with your phone, your friends, trying to keep you away from them until you'd go through the same as your other skeptic partner, Taeyong made sure that Yuta would be sick enough after returning home to keep him from even getting up from his bed. Temporary paralysis. Your other friends, of course they tried reaching out to you, only for him to cut the service to keep you away from them for a while. They got easily distracted from you ignoring their texts as they were focused on reaching out to Yuta.

Unknown: Hey Y/n, I'm Yuta's friend. He told me you aren't replying to his texts so asked me to do so.

Y/n: Who's this?

Unknown: Oh! I'm Taeyong! A close friend of well, your friend XD.

Y/n: Nice to meet you, Taeyong. I'm Y/n but it seems like you already know that.

Unknown: Yeah :). Yuta's on his way here and told me that you'd be joining us? Are you nearby?

Y/n: He left? No, actually, I'm just leaving my place. I guess I'll meet you there?

Taeyong: Meet ya :)

[23:22PM, 31st October, 2020 continued. ]

Hailing a cab to the address Yuta had sent you with his friends, Taeyong's number saved on your phone in case the later won't pick up, you left your place. Still feeling a little eerie from how Yuta just decided to leave you behind when he could've just offered to go together, which is pure Yuta style. He probably wasn't in the best of moods but he could've at least texted you letting you know of his departure from the apartment building.

The journey to the given address didn't take that long surprisingly. A little towards the outskirts of the town in a much aloof part but nonetheless, doable. It's not like you'd be alone there any ways. Paying for your fare, you took your purse, brushed your fingers through your hair to tame it a little from the ride, and turned towards the building, jumping slightly at the bright haired guy sitting by the front porch. Adorning the simplest of fit, a black knee slit jeans, with a graphic tee and a black leather jacket with a chain or two. He, in no doubts, was ethereal. His pale skin stood out the most in the street light if you could call it that and his lips seemed a little drained of blood, eyes hollow yet captivating when he looked up from the dirt below him to you who still stood yards away. Smiling, he got up, making his way towards after brushing off the invisible lint from his jeans, "Hey" he offered you his hands for you to shake upon reaching you. "Hey..? Taeyong, right?"

Wanting so badly to smirk, he only looked down with a silent snicker, looking up immediately to not look suspicious, "Yeah, Y/n..?" you nod in response, shuddering from the coldness of his skin, "Have you been out for too long? You're freezing," you exclaim, looking at him with a guilty expression and taking a mental note to hit Yuta for not arriving earlier. "Oh no, i just reached a minute or two prior to your arrival." you nod in understanding, withdrawing your hands from his hold, "By the way, Yuta called me a few minutes ago, telling me that he wouldn't make it and to just carry on" Taeyong said, looking at you with his eyebrows raised at your confused, innocent expression, his humane form threatening to change into his original form. "What? Why? It's like,-" you look down at your wrist watch, "11:50! And he's bailing out now?", smiling at you in fake sympathy, he replied, "he said he had other things to take care of," "But you said he'd left the place and was on his way here?" you ask, hands on either sides of your hip, "Last minute plan changes" Taeyong shrugs, "Anyways, let's get inside?"

He pointed towards the front door with both his hands, gesturing you to go forward first. And so you do. You offer him a smile before turning your back towards him and making your way towards the old house, the door seemingly open. Climbing up the stairs with caution, humming at the sound of dried leaves crunching up below your feet with each footstep. Taeyong stood behind where you two had introduced yourselves for a few minutes, a few more minutes. "Taeyong? Are you not coming?" you turn around slightly, looking over your shoulder at lad standing still, "Yeah, I'm coming" he replied soullessly, still standing his group until he saw you open the door ajar and then took his first step forward. Not bothering to go too quick.

The insides were simple, very very simple yet magnificent. The flooring seemed to be that of wooden finishing that creaked with each step you took, implying that of how old the infrastructure must be. You look around in awe, clutching at the sling bag that you carried along. You go corner to corner, not bothering to look behind to see if the friendly stranger was hot on your trail, instead seemingly being captivated by the olden time-ish wallpapers and paintings and antique pieces that the wall adorned. Taeyong on the other hand was just growing restless, 4 more minutes until he could play his next victim, he was growing frantic. He did follow you inside, instead opting to walk the opposite direction as you, towards where he'd hidden the paper with your crimson blood and name written on it, contemplating whether to just tear it and carry on proving his existence to the female in the room. 3 more minutes, he bit into his lips, "Taeyong? Look, i found something!" He heard you scream.

Puffing out a breath of frustration, Taeyong replied "Coming!" and he walked out of the room, hands in his pocket towards where you stood by the bottom of the stairs, looking at the lighter in your hand that seemed relatively unused. "I found lighter down here" you look at him with a tiny pout evident on your lips, looking back and forth between the candle and the guy, puzzled. "It must be some thugs who came here to smoke or something" He shrugged it off, taking the lighter out of your hand. It must be you over analyzing things but without a single light turned on in the villa with only your flashlight acting as a source of light, but Taeyong looked even more lifeless than before. Eyes dark ebony and dangerous, somehow intimidating, lips adorning a bright shade of red in contrast to how you saw it the first time, and his aura had seemingly darkened. 2 more minutes. You shake your head and walk up the stairs and towards a room which has it's door wide open. Choosing to lay out your things there, you stretch out a few stiff limbs, "So, me and the boys were planning on doing the midnight game, you know. One of those stupid creepy pastas? I can't believe all of them bailed out on me last minute," you speak particularly to no one in the room, assuming that Taeyong was listening to you, whose ears only perked up at the words midnight and stupid. Midnight. 00:00Am. The devil smirked to himself. Midnight, at last.

"I mean, Yangyang, Jaemin and Haechan came off as no shock to me- they're the other friend's by the way, but Yuta, it's weird for him to at least not let me know." You keep going, scrolling through your phone screen, only for it to load suddenly, No internet access. Sighing, you pull out offline downloads, "Did he tell you anything else? Like if he's feeling unwell or something?" you ask, letting the question float in the air, waiting for a reply. Getting known even after the passing of a few seconds, a minute too maybe, "Taeyong?" you stand up from the bed, well, the bed frame and make your way outside, "Tae?" you look left and right, searching for any moving soul when you feel your phone vibrate in your hands, and the sound of notification resonates through the eerie silence. You look down at the device in your hand, one new message from Yuta san and an immediate black out of the screen. Impossible.

You remembered full well charging your phone to a hundred percent before leaving your dorm. Hell, you even kept it on airplane mode your whole cab ride. Shrugging it off, you keep your phone beside your bag and then proceed to go out to look for your new friend? acquaintance? You didn't even know how to classify him as yet. "Tae, if you're trying to scare me, I'll give you heads up, it doesn't work on me." you chuckle, walking to the room beside the one you were previously lounging in. "It's past midnight and we both seem too uninterested to try out whatever we were supposed to anyways, how about we just head out?" you start, looking down at your wrist watch which displayed 00:09 on the screen in neon green. "I mean, it was stupid enough that my friends and i even decided to try it out knowing it's some made up shit to scare some seven olds, probably" you continue, feeling as though you're talking to the walls at the lack of response. "Taeyong, come on. I'm growing bored."

"Tae-" "You know, the way you logicised made it seem like you're smart enough. It was impressive," you hear his voice, a little too hoarse and plain for your liking, he continued before you could muster up a reply, "But seems like you aren't all that smart after all, seeing how you believed a total stranger and are even ready to spend time with him." you look around the place, only hearing his voice but his figure to be nowhere near you, "Taeyong, what are you talking about?" you head out of the room you currently stood in, jogging to catch his voice.

"It was a little angering you know? The way you spoke about me and my followers, it was disrespectful. And I could've taken you then and there, but what to do. You seemed too cute to take your soul without a small game? Is that what you humans call it?" You feel breathing fanning the nape of your neck and a cold air following it right after, making you turn back, "Your friend got his share of play" you whip your head forward, finally seeing the male in front of you, standing by the door frame of a connective hallway, you swore you felt his presence behind you though. His infamous smirk still adorning his features. Figure a little more towering and intimidating. If you thought he couldn't have seemed more lifeless a few minutes ago, then his appearance now only seemed to prove you wrong. "So it's only fair if you got your part of the play too, right?"

"Taeyong, you're only making your existence weird for me, let's go if you're done." He only tilted his head in amusement, "Oh it's only about to get weirder, darling" You turn back to face a blood red shot eyed male, well, Taeyong, eliciting a gasp from you, you look over your shoulder to see the place where Taeyong stood a blink of eye ago. "How..did-" His chest visibly vibrated from the hearty laugh he let out, "How did I do that?," you step back as his voice dropped even lower, only for you to bump your back into something rigid, something cold, making you let out a yelp as Taeyong seemed to stand still in front of you, "I can do a whole lot of things," you feared turning back, the insides of your stomach hurdling around as whatever was behind you reached their arms up and held you still in a vice grip. "Y/n!" you hear a voice scream from downstairs, "Y/n! Come out! We need to get out of here!" you recognize the voice as that of your friends, Yuta's.

You squirm hard to loosen the person's grip on your shoulder. Once succeeding, you bolt down the stairs, skipping a few steps, tripping now and then but nevertheless making it down without landing face first as you hear Taeyong's laugh thunder throughout the place. You take a turn to reach the front door, where Yuta stood in all his glory. You immediately run into his embrace, ignoring how his body seemed just as cold as the one you felt from whatever Taeyong was, "Y-yuta, he's sick, let's go, we need to go!" you try pulling Yuta's body a little closer to the exit, only for him to stand his ground, wrapping his hands around you even tighter as he caressed your hair, "Oh, Y/n.." your body goes stiff as your eyebrows furrowed in confusion, that sounded nothing like your best friend, "Yuta..?"

You try pulling your head away from the nape of his neck to look at him, "No darling, it's 'stupid made up shit''," his body vibrated once again from the laughing against yours, as you feel yourself growing scared each passing second. You try mustering up all your strength to bring it to his sides and push him away when you feel a plush yet cold muscle press against your neck, only for it to go futile. "Still made up for you?" you feel a sharp pang of pain flow through your nerves, result of him biting the skin in a manner far too away from soft, "Taeyon-g- lord--midnight man, whatever you are.. I'm --sorry" you say in a hushed voice, scared that if you voiced out a little louder, he'd pounce at you. You feel him nibble at the soft skin, making you whimper, "Oh no, darling, do not apologize. Your doings really intoxicated me. Kept me entertained for a while."

"But now, it's angering me to know a feeble creature as you kept poking fun at my people. At me. And I want no more than to turn you into something belonging to me. Who'd worship me the way 'my people' do." He whispered against the area, lifting his head up and leaning down, making sure not to let go of his grip on you, "oh no, pretty girls aren't supposed to cry. Tsk tsk, what is this, Y/n" His eyes bore holes onto the crown of your head. "Look at me." he acted on making you look at him faster than you could, "Could you beg for forgiveness? Give me a piece of yourself?" he inched closer to your face, a small snarl escaping his throat at your scared and trembling figure, "Or you could just be my queen and come below with me, and you'd not have to cut down your lifespan"

"Are you turned on by all of this, Y/n? Or is it out of fear?" you let out a shaky breath as the tip of his nose touched yours, "Because i can smell you from here and oh," he let out what sounded like an animalistic growl, "Is it delicious.". "Taeyong, please let me go.. I'm sorry. I really am, just please don't hurt me,-" you let out a whine of pain when you feel his other hand knot his fingers in your locks and pull it back with much aggression, immediately planting his lips onto your trembling once, bearing his fang like teeth into plush flesh to draw out blood, earning a loud high pitched scream from your end as you try your best to push him away, futile once again. His hands tighten their grip at the waist while his other hand pulled your head further back, latching onto the firm skin of your neck, treating it with the same aggression, puncturing through the skin with his teeth as your hands go limp beside your body, nevertheless, letting out a whimper from the harsh treatment, which, in all your defense couldn't be help since you still are a human with all emotion any human would feel, that including lust. You feel his cold lips curve into a smirk against where blood flowed out, lapping it up with his tongue as you feel your vision blacken the more as time went by.

"Oh darling you're no different than me.."

4th November, 19:48Pm, 2020.

"She's awake!!" you blink multiple times to get accustomed to the blaring lights in the room, a comfortable white filling your eyesight. You move your head towards the side to find all your friends sprawled out on each side. A drip connected to your hands making you squint in confusion, "Can you hear us, Y/n?" you feel your shoulders being shaken as jolt, "Hey? Yeah i can hear you, why won't i be able to?" you ask, confusion still laced in your voice, "Because you hadn't responded to us the last time we called you. And because you've been laying dead the past few days" Jaemin spoke up first, earning a smack from his elder brother

"Why didn't you stop when we screamed your name the other day, Y/n? You literally weren't breathing the day we found you" Yangyang inquired and stated, "And why did you leave us all on seen??" Haechan added, "Most of all, where were you even??" Yuta spoke. You hiss at all the questions being thrown at you as you try sitting up by the inclined hospital bed, "Screamed? Didn't respond? I left you on seen? That's highly impossible and where was i??" you stare blankly at the plain wall in front of you, trying to remember any such episode. The more you strained your head, the more clueless you grew. Your throat starts to grow dry so you turn your neck to check if there are any water bottles nearby, only for a sharp pain to flow through your nerves at a particular spot in your throat. You yelp at the sudden pain, "I'll get the doctor," Haechan rushed outside, when you reached out to touch your neck, feeling it with the tips of your finger, feeling in the swollen skin, the dried up blood when it all hit you. Your eyes grow wide as you start shaking, for it to be first noticed by Yuta, "Yuta, that house! The game, it's all real! I saw hi-him, his name! I swear he's real!" growing concerned at your sudden frenzy behavior, Yuta kneeled down beside your bed, holding your non-injected hand giving it a comforting behavior.

"Calm down, angel. Tell me point by point," he encouraged you to take in a long breath, as Haechan rushed in along with the doctor whose face was half covered with a doctor's mask, "Doctor, he-he's probably out for me, you need to get me far away from here! Please" you beg with your eyes stinging with all the tears, "No one's going to get you from here, Ms. Y/n, you're safe here" You pause your frantic actions for a while. That voice sounded a little too familiar for your liking, making you think you're over analyzing everything again. The doctor gestured to your friends to leave you up to him to have a doctor to patient talk. All of your friends nodded in understanding, giving you one last reassuring smile before collectively leaving the room.

The doctor, once after making sure that everyone left, removed his mask to reveal the oh so familiar smirk and the hair protector, rustling the same, familiar bright red hair with the same familiar pale fingers of his. Your eyes widen, mouth falls wide ajar

"Oh wait, there's one last warning, Do not assume that the Midnight Man has left your home for good at the conclusion of the game. I'm for real done now" You laugh at your friend who snatched the phone away from you,

"Pleasure to meet you again, darling"

244 notes · View notes

peach-pops · 4 years

Note

Hello! Do you remember "Dating a Hothead/easily angered girlfriend" blog from anonymous? Can I request for Akaashi, Kageyama, Ushijima, Sugawara, and Tsukishima of how will they react to their s/o? Thank you! I really really really love that blog! It really reminds me of me of being sassy 😂. Anyways, sorry for bothering you *bows*

Author’s note: UGH Im so sorry this took me so long to get out! I only did Kageyama and Akaashi cause I wanted a bit of a contrast hope that’s okay! Also, I wanna point out that there’s nothing wrong with defending yourself, even if things do get violent. I don’t condone violence I’m just saying to protect yourself in the best way possible!

Here’s the first part!

Akaashi and Kageyama with a Hotheaded Girlfriend

-Akaashi-

Akaashi knows how angry you get so he always does his best to try and make sure everything goes smoothly to avoid any casualties

BUT Akaashi can’t control every little thing and he realizes this fairly early in your relationship

I’m a full believer that Bokuto loves raves and clubbing and because of this, he usually drags you and Akaashi along

One night you three and a couple of other Fukurodani members are out clubbing and immediately, Akaashi surveys the room: where are the exits? Where’s the bathroom? Which group looks like trouble? Where did his girlfriend and best friend go???

He spots a group of girls near the bar that are a part of a bachelorette party who are a bit rowdy but he kinda brushes them off cause there’s nothing threatening about six girls wearing cheap wedding veils

You guys get your own private table in the corner ( bless Konoha and his connections) and after an hour or two of drinking and dancing, you take the initiative to go buy the next round of drinks cause that’s just club etiquette and you’re lowkey ballin

Let’s get it miss independent !!!! 😤 😤 😤

Akaashi offers to go with you but you tell him to watch Bokuto cause he might bust his head from dancing on the table

Once you make it to the bar, you decide just to order a pretty expensive bottle for the table because you’re not confident in your ability to carry six shots back without spilling it everywhere

You pay for the bottle and start making your way back to the table when you see the bridal party from earlier hanging out at your table. You see two girls laughing side by side with Bokuto (ok my dude get some) BUT THEN you search for Akaashi and sure enough, you see him visibly uncomfortable as the ‘soon to be bride’ tries sitting in your mans lap.

Akaashi looks up and he’s conflicted cause he wants your help to get this drunk girl off of him but he also knows you’re crazy and you might kill her in the process

“ Your hair looks so sexy pushed back! Has anyone ever told you that before?”

“ Please go away, my girlfriend is coming and she won’t be happy-”

“ Aw girlfriend? No fair why are the cute ones always taken?”

“ Aren’t you getting married?”

You’re gripping the bottle so tight in your hands and Akaashi can see it in your eyes that you are soooo close to hitting this bitch over the head with the bottle

He already knows exactly what you’re thinking and he’s pleading with you not to just with his eyes

Would you kill a girl over sitting in your mans lap? Yeah probably I mean you were fucking crazy

BUT since you could see how serious Akaashi was, you loosened your grip on the bottle and placed it on the table. Before the bride could even look over, you had already lightly nudged pushed her off of Akaashi’s lap and sat down on your boyfriend as if to claim him

“ What is your problem, you didn’t have to push me!” The bride whined as she got off the floor but you kept your glare on her

Akaashi squeezed your thigh to try and calm you down but maybe it was because of the alcohol so you just clenched your fists even tighter

“ You’re lucky all I did was push you. I can’t believe you’re about to get married and you’re trying to straddle my fucking boyfriend!”

Akaashi can feel how tense you are so he sits you on the inside of the booth so he can be in the middle between the girl and you. At this point, you’re sitting next to Bokuto and he’s laughing nervously cause he’s never seen you act like this before but he’s a ride or die so hes automatically team Y/N

“ Are you threatening me?”

“ Yeah, I am. What are you going to do about it?”

“ Y/N stop-”

“ Yeah, listen to your boyfriend bitch.”

“ WHO THE HELL ARE YOU CALLING A BITCH?!”

Before you can lunge over the table, Akaashi keeps his arm out and blocks you from doing so. He turns to the girl and bows his head, trying not to let his own anger consume him,” I think you should leave.”

“ And what if I don’t want to?” The soon to be bride pokes bitterly as she attempts to wrap her arm around Akaashi’s shoulders,” what is your girlfriend gonna do, hit me?”

She’s right, you can’t launch yourself across the table and your arm doesn’t have the reach but you had alternatives. You grabbed a half-drunken glass of some brown rum and you flung the alcohol into the girls face

Everyone at the table was SHOCKED, lowkey including you cause you didn’t even mean to throw the drink in her face it just happened YOU SWEAR it was just an instinct

Who could blame you I mean you were so mad plus you had been watching so many compilations of “ Best Housewives Fights from Bravo” that it was the first thing you could think of

Akaashi, bless him and his brilliant mind, immediately blocked your body with his because the soon to be bride tries climbing into the booth to beat you up and Bokuto also has a protective grip on your wrist to stop you from killing her

LUCKILY before you could spill any blood, security comes and forces the girl to leave your table

At first, you thought Akaashi was mad at you so you kind of pout and tell him how sorry you were but Akaashi doesn’t even care he just makes sure you’re okay

In his head, he knows maybe you were in the wrong for pushing the girl but he would never admit it outloud cause he values his life

My heart swoons for this man

Bokuto on the other hand is slapping your back and shaking your shoulders going,” Holy crap Y/N that was AWESOME!!!”

-Kageyama-

You and Kageyama had only recently started dating so he probably doesn’t have any idea how mad you could get. He’s seen a few times where you’ve gotten upset over school or your family problems but he still didn’t think too much about it

Who was he to be put off at having an easily angered s/o when he was balancing between his own emotions?

Anyway! You were one of Karasuno’s managers and you and Kiyoko got SO CLOSE! The job was super easy and it meant you could spend more time with your boyfriend so win-win!

The only part that was ever hard for you was other guys constantly hitting on you and Kiyoko like damn okay you both were hot as hell but at least treat girls with respect?

You didn’t mind guys telling you that you both were pretty caused duh you two already knew that but most of them were SOOO disgusting and you never let it slide

Before one of Karasuno’s games, you were on the sidelines with Kiyoko chatting about the next match when you could hear some of the guys from the other team trying to get your attention

“ Damn, Karasuno girls really are as fine as they say, they look soooo good.”

“ God, the things I would do if I was alone with them.”

“ I know you two can hear us, turn around so we can see what we’re working with.”

You just kept your eyes locked onto your clipboard because you didn’t want Kageyama to see how fucking crazy you could get but JESUS it was so hard when these two guys were harassing you

“ Kiyoko, I will fucking lose my mind if they come over here. I think I’m going to snap someone’s neck,” You said through gritted teeth as you watched your boyfriend warm up.

“Maybe you should go cool off in the bathroom before the game starts. I’ll let Kageyama-Kun know what’s going on and I’ll meet you in the hallway,” Kiyoko suggested as you gave her prayer hands cause she really do be a queen

You took your clipboard with you as if it was a weapon and stomped out to the bathroom cause you knew if you stayed in that gym any longer, you would cause a scene

You rinsed your face in the bathroom and you took a few deep breaths as you tried to calm yourself down

Your friends and family always told you that you needed to get your anger under control and now that you were dating, the last thing you needed was to scare Kageyama off

When you started to head out towards the gym, you felt in the air that something was off like spidey senses but instead, it’s like a creep radar was sounding off in your head

That’s when you saw Kiyoko and one of the guys from earlier cornering her against a wall

You can see that Kiyoko was visibly uncomfortable and you were just about to push your limit

“ I said to leave me alone. I’m waiting for a friend.”

“ Oh, you mean the other manager? I’m telling you, we would treat you like absolute queens at our school-”

“ Hey dude, back the hell off!” You shoved the guy to the side pretty hard to the point where he stumbled back a few good feet,” fucking creep.”

This dude, this mf has the audacity to POST UP TO YOU! You’re not even intimidated by him even though he’s easily half a foot taller than you

Like he’s in your face cause now he’s pissed that this girl actually managed to shove him pretty hard

“ Lay your hands on me again and see what happens.”

“ Are you threatening me? Cause if you are, go on and try to hit me I fucking dare you!”

Kiyoko is like nuh uh not on my watch and while im pretty sure kiyoko can throw fucking hands, she ran to go get Kageyama like “ go get ur girl”

This alerts pretty much the whole team even though they’re supposed to be warming up, they go with Kageyama cause if the boys hear your name and that you need help, they get hella protective

Kageyama slides over to the hallway and sees this dude yelling in your face and he sees red when the guy lays a hand on your shoulder

Before Kageyama can even make it over to you, you smash your clipboard over the guys head so hard, he hits the floor

BUT BRUH once he hits the floor you don’t! Stop! hitting ! him!

Like that clipboard is the perfect weapon oml

“ Don’t! Ever! Touch! Me!” You literally bash him after every word and this dude can’t even fight back like I personally dont feel bad but ummmmm you might commit murder

Kageyama rushes over to you and grabs you so you can stop and he’s trying to calm you down but once the word “bitch” slips out of the guys mouth, Kageyama grabs him by the jersey and is shaking him like a ragdoll

“ Watch your goddamn mouth before I put my fist through it!”

And you’re still heated so you want to basically jump this dude with your boyfriend cause romance ya know but Suga is holding you back ( he highkey struggling)

And now Noya and Tanaka are trying to hold Kageyama back because while they definitely would’ve reacted the same way, they don’t want Kageyama to go overboard

“ What did you just say? Go on and say it again-”

“ Kageyama please!”

“ You’re lucky I’m getting held back-”

“ Y/N! Enough!”

Just two lovebirds threatening a dudes life I love it

Things get resolved pretty quickly thanks to daddy daichi calming everyone down and now it’s time for the match to start

Suga lets go of you when Kageyama walks over and the first thing he does is hug you tightly. He practically squeezes the life out of you like this experience really showed how protective he was

He even admits that while he’s glad you can handle yourself, you shouldn't have to stand up to people alone and 100% doesn’t think you overreacted at all especially when Kiyoko thanks you for sticking up for her

He’s a bit intimidated by how you acted only because he had never saw you that mad before but he doesn’t blame you for how you handled it

451 notes · View notes

novasintheroom · 4 years

Note

Ooooo a fresh blog! Heyo there! So, my first request is some head canons, if you write them anyway, for the each of the turtles having a s/o who is usually the purest of beans. Like— she doesn’t get angry, usually shy when meeting new people, very humble, sweet and caring— but for the first time she does it’s like she realizes she’s frustrated and mad about something that happened during the day and it’s the first time she’s expressing it. the turtles notice her come in knowing something is off about her behavior when she’s usually so cheerful. Almost like “Sometimes it just makes me so— it makes me so... so...! Angry!” But she actually gets super surprised with herself realizing she’s actually venting just to say she’s fine in the end after bottling up for so long. The turtles just looking at her and asking if she’s okay 😂 If that makes any sense.. sorry if it doesn’t.

Oooooo my first ask!! I’m so nervous and excited! I think I got the gist of what you’re getting at. Thanks for sending this in, it means a lot to me! <3

Leo

· Honestly caught off guard when you come in steaming

· Your calm and sweetness is something he loves and looks forward to – it’s hard being the firm leader in his family when everyone pushes back, so you’re a pleasant break from the arguments and sassy remarks

· Not today

· It’s loud in the lair – Raph and Mikey are doing something with a basketball and hula hoop that’s got Raph raging and Mikey screaming, Donnie’s got a power tool going on the truck, and Splinter’s Celine Dion music is blaring to drown it all out while he works on pruning his plants

· Leo’s up in the concrete rafters with a book, glancing down every other minute to make sure Raph doesn’t kill Mikey

· He would have completely missed you coming in if Mikey hadn’t thrown the ball toward the entrance

· You dodge the ball before it hits you, but instead of laughing it off like usual, you throw a dark look at his brothers and beeline toward the dojo.

· Woah, that’s weird

· Avoidance of his family = big red flag

· You didn’t even say hi to him??

· Hops down and follows, waving off Mikey’s calls to you

· Finds you in the corner of the dojo, bag thrown to the side and hands smoothing out the sand of his small zen garden

· Feels a bit awkward honestly

· Listen, he’s getting better at it, but he’s not the best at feelings

· Especially girl feelings

· He knows something’s up though, and he wouldn’t be a good beau if he just let you simmer

· Spooks you when he asks if you’re okay

· Darn those ninja skills, how is someone as big as him so silent?

· You sigh and just say you had a fight with your roommate and that it’s fine, you just needed some quiet before you went to his family

· Okay, coolcoolcool. He can work with this. He and Raph fight all the time! “What was the fight about?”

· Cue explosion

· “She doesn’t pay her part of the bills on time, and she has her boyfriend over constantly and I can hear them through the walls when they’re screwing because the stupid cheap apartment has stupid cheap thin walls, and she leaves her dishes everywhere even when I ask her to not be a slob, and the landlord is getting after me for her rent when– “

· W o w

· He didn’t think you knew any swear words, but the names you’re calling your roommate would make even Raph blush

· Your rant goes on and on

· Anytime he tries to suggest a solution you get angry at him like why can’t he just listen omg

· He shuts up quick

· Somewhere in the process he sat down and your head moved to his lap while you laid all your problems out

· By the time you’re finished your chest is heaving and it’s been an hour

· Leo’s scared to say something in case you go off again lmao

· He just plays with your hair and hums while you calm down

· Finally you look at him with wide eyes, “Wow, geez, I didn’t think I was that mad.”

· He can’t help but laugh, “Me neither.”

· Your smile is back, though, and that’s the best thing he’s seen all day

· “You feeling better now?”

· You say yes, and give him a good hug and kiss as thanks for his patience

· He asks you to come to him if things start building up again

· Seriously, start talking to him – I don’t think the poor guy can handle another explosion like that lol

Raph

· Raph knows anger

· Does he know how to deal with it? Ehhh that’s hit-and-miss

· But he knows it

· So seeing your tense shoulders, clenched fists, grinding teeth when you walk in – he knows you’re angry

· It’s a bit off-putting tbh – you’re the calm to his rage, the quiet touch to wind him down when something gets under his skin

· What happened to make his quiet girl so mad?

· Did someone say something about your family?

· Or something about your outfit?

· Did a skeevy guy try to touch you?

· Did someone try to kiss you?

· Okay, now he’s getting mad

· Decides to take a page from Splinter’s book and pulls you aside to talk

· “What’s the matter?”

· You pull at your sleeves, looking anywhere but him

· You just mumble you’re fine, and that you’re hungry and try to move to the kitchen

· Nuh-uh, that don’t work with him

· Catches you by the arm and gives you a look, “Somethin’s bothering you, and you’re gonna tell me what it is.”

· “And what if I don’t wanna talk about it?”

· “Tough luck.”

· Your glare could curdle milk, but you don’t say anything

· Alright, you wanna play it that way? He’s got three brothers he grew up with; he can get it out of you.

· Hauls you up and tosses you over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and takes you to his workout station

· Ignores your screams of outrage and the beating fists on his shell

· They’re like little kitten paw pats; he can’t help but smile at how small you really are

· When he sets you down in front of a world-weary punching bag, he crosses his arms and waits

· You’re red faced and snarling. “What are you doing?”

· He raises a fist, and gives the bag a good punch – “That’s for when Mikey backwashed into my water bottle today.” He throws another punch, “And that’s for Donnie’s stupid snorts waking me up last night,” and another, “and now I’m back on Mikey’s backwash!”

· He stops the bag’s swaying and gestures for you to take a turn

· Realization dawns in your eyes. You look at your fist and throw a pathetic punch at it. “That’s…for my fifth plant…dying this week?”

· He almost laughs, but nods encouragement

· You punch again. “That’s for whoever stole my lunch out of the fridge at work.”

· And again. “And for those kids who spit on that homeless guy!”

· And again. “And for Gina’s face when she made fun of my teeth!”

· Punch after punch, you let out your anger and frustrations that boiled over today

· Raph’s impressed – not just with how much crap happened to you, but how long you held it in

· You’re a lot stronger than he gave you credit for

· He’s also a bit freaked at seeing the rage in your eyes

· Is that what others see when he comes at them?

· Yeesh

· You feel a lot better after the session, if sheepish for letting so much anger show

· But he brushes it off, “Hey, you see how I am. It don’t bother me none, sweetheart.”

· He pinches your butt for good measure as you walk back to the lair and laughs when you punch him in the arm

Donnie

· The one that takes the longest to realize something’s up

· He can’t help it! He’s busy making sure his family is safe and hidden! He’s gotta keep the firewall up-to-date from all the new viruses being put out, check the perimeter lasers so that no one sneaks up on them, change the oil in the Turtle Tank, and why is the computer sparking over here, he needs to ask Raph or Leo to come with him to get new parts at the junkyard, but if he –

· Bumps into you and is like ‘oh. how’d you get in here’

· Delighted to see you though! It’s like all his worries suddenly vanished when he realized ‘oh yeah! I have a girlfriend!’ and that’s you!

· Missed you a lot since it’s been a few days since you could visit

· Starts showing you all of the progress he’s made on certain things, asks you how school’s going, how was that group project you had, did you get that interview for work?

· It’s your clipped and short answers that finally makes him take a step back and really see how you’re doing

· You’ve always been enthusiastic about his inventions, even if you don’t completely understand every technical thing he talks about. He thought you guys were past the awkward conversations too.

· Clipped answers are a big no-no – it makes him shrink inside, like his words and ideas don’t matter

· Takes a few seconds to look you over – awkward seconds, ones where you look down and away and not at him

· “Are you alright? Did…something happen?”

· You take a few deep breaths, trying to calm yourself, but then the words just start pouring out: “I’m sorry, it’s just, I can’t stop thinking about how my supervisors treated me the past few days. They scheduled me to work a triple shift! Without asking me! And I told them I had a date with you, and a million other things to do, but – “

· You lay it out for him, apologizing every other minute for just putting this on him out of the blue, that you tried really hard to be happy coming to the lair but your boss just text you that you have another shift tonight instead of getting to hang out with Donnie, and –

· Donnie sits you both down in a couple of chairs, his hands holding your own as you keep talking and venting

· Rubs circles into your palm, eyes never straying from your own watery and frustrated ones

· A breath out of the nose is the end to your rant, and you lean to put your head on his shoulder. “I just hate when people spring things on me! I just wanna stay with you and hand you tools to work on stuff.”

· His heart warms at this, even if he’s sad at how sucky your job is

· And it gives him an idea

· He manages to hack into your work’s scheduling system and put your supervisors or fellow employees in your place for the night

· Even sends out a text masked as your head boss to whoever he put, letting them know they’re on the job and that you had an emergency

· You’re torn on this – those people had things they had to do too

· But Donnie reassures you: “If they’re as bad as you say, then getting more people mad at them might just make them change. If not, we at least get to have our date night, right?”

· Well, when you put it that way…

· He gets a big, long smooch for pulling it off and for listening to you

Mikey

· Listen, this boy is intuitive when it comes to emotions.

· He kinda has to be with the type of older brothers he has lmao

· Instantly knows something’s up by the sound of your feet coming down the tunnels – heavy, like you want to stomp them but don’t know how

· He’s geared up though – his baby girl’s coming!

· Hops off the couch and has the biggest grin for you when you walk in

· Doesn’t even falter when he sees the glower on your face

· Says something stupid to test the waters – “Woah, babe, I’m gonna have to call the cops – I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to be as fine as you are!”

· Not even a smirk.

· Okay okay. Obvi you’re not in a happy mood.

· Man, he was hoping for a little blush at least!

· Takes that heavy bag off your shoulders you’ve been lugging around all day and corrals you back to the couch

· Grabs some sodas and a few chocolate bars from his hidden stash in the kitchen

· He knows you need it more than him right now

· Sits down and calls out to the lair that “we’re making out on the couch!!” Def keeps his family from coming in and interrupting lol

· Isn’t even phased when you explode about your day – your coworker had it out for you, your professor told the whole class that your paper was what not to do if you wanted a good grade, etc. etc.

· Mikey accents your day with “No!” and “He didn’t!” and “What a jerk!”

· It’s cathartic to hear someone agree with you like that

· He takes you in his arms when the frustrated tears start falling and you start to wind down

· “It just makes me so angry, and I hate feeling embarrassed and…”

· Rubs circles on your back to help calm you, just like his family did to him growing up

· After a minute you’re better, and back to your sweet, happy self, if still a bit stuffy from the tears and snot

· You’re surprised and apologize for your emotions, but he stops you

· “Hey, everyone has their bad days! Sometimes you just gotta let it out, y’know?”

· You give him a big kiss for being so sweet

· Makes the day a lot better after that with the soda and candy and some video games

· He’s a good turt <3

#tmnt #reader x tmnt #reader x leo #reader x mikey #reader x raph #reader x donnie #reader insert #answer #anonymous question #tmnt leonardo #tmnt raphael #tmnt donatello #tmnt michelangelo #sfw #leonardo x reader #raphael x reader #michelangelo x reader #donatello x reader #my writing

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dessarious · 4 years

Text

Guilt and Consequences Pt3

Okay, so I am still working on my other stories I just haven’t been able to get much down. I’m working a crap ton of overtime at the moment and I’m just fried when I get home. I’d say hopefully I’ll be more productive on the weekends but right now I’m working Saturdays and and Sundays are becoming catch up on sleep days. So sorry for the delays, but I’ll try to get back into a headspace where I don’t just want to pass out whenever I’m not at work. Oh and I think I got everyone tagged who asked but let me know if I didn’t or you want to be added.

AO3 Beginning Previous Next

The silence stretched on and Lila could only sit there. She knew the others were likely staring at her. Wondering what she’d done to make her mother react like that. She just wished she had an answer for them. Even before everything with the schools they’d never been close. Her mother pretty much only talked to her to tell her what she needed to improve. As the atmosphere became more and more uncomfortable Lila finally broke the silence.

“So… would you consider that a yes or a no?” More silence before M. Dupain cleared his throat.

“Marinette why don’t you go with Lila to pack an overnight bag? We’ll get dinner and some treats started. Is there anything you can’t eat or something you’d like to have?” It took her a moment to realize that last part was aimed at her. When she managed to look up his expression matched the gentle tone of his voice and she just got even more confused.

“No sir. I’m not picky.” Her mother rarely made it home to eat with her and even then it was always take out. She’d gotten used to left overs or eating whatever random things were in the house.

“Make sure to pack all your medications as well.” Madam Cheng’s voice sounded a little strange but when Lila managed to look up at her she wasn’t glaring and she didn’t look annoyed. She was definitely more stiff than she’d been before though.

“It’s okay if you don’t want me here anymore. I get it. Even offering is more than most people would have done in your situation.” She still had no idea why they did either. After everything that had happened to their daughter because of her they should be throwing her out, at the very least. The woman’s expression turned to one of motherly concern and it honestly made her more nervous. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had aimed that kind of look at her.

“You’re welcome here, anytime you need somewhere to go, as long as you stop all this lying. There are better ways to deal with your problems.” Lila could only hang her head and mumble another apology. While she agreed that the lying in this situation wasn’t a good idea, it normally didn’t backfire like this and she had tried other things first. Maybe it was different for other people. She heard the woman let out a frustrated sigh. “You two go on, we’ve got to finish closing up the bakery before we start on dinner.” She let Marinette pull her out of her seat and down the stairs. She was still too busy trying to understand what was happening to even consider arguing.

“Did your mom really put you on medication just to keep you in school?” She glanced at Marinette. There was no accusation in the question. More like she just couldn’t understand how someone could do something like that.

“Yes but I don’t take it. Well, except one of the anxiety meds every once in a while when I can’t sleep. As she said on the phone, she thinks I should be responsible for myself so she just assumes I’m actually taking them.” She hadn’t understood at first why her mother would work so hard to get the meds and then not bother to monitor their use. She’d come to the conclusion it was so that when the school finally called about her ‘behavioral’ issues she would have a paper trail to be able to sell them on the fact that Lila was just sick and needed special accommodations. That or she really didn’t think Lila would disobey her on this.

When they got to the apartment building Lila wasn’t really paying attention. She heard something that sounded like a cough but kept walking towards the elevator until Marinette tugged on her sleeve. When she looked over at the other girl Marinette motioned to the side and Lila saw three rather annoyed looking staff members.

“Guests have to be signed in.” She blinked at the woman who spoke, not really processing the words.

“I’m sorry, what?” The woman just rolled her eyes.

“This is a high security building Mlle. Rossi. All guests have to be signed in.” Oh, right. She vaguely remembered something about that from when they’d first moved in. She just had never actually brought someone home before.

“Sorry, I forgot. Umm… how exactly do I do that?” The woman just looked exasperated now, but the man behind the desk offered a smile and motioned them over. There was a clipboard on the desk and he handed her a pen.

“You just need to put your name, apartment number, and your guests name.” He pointed to each column in turn . She filled them out as he asked and handed the pen back. “Thank you Mlle. Rossi, have a nice day.”

“Thank you, you as well.” She could still see the disapproving look on the woman’s face as they continued to the elevator and couldn’t help but wonder how she still had a job if this was how she normally treated tennants. Personally she couldn’t remember any of the staff and didn’t really interact with them. Generally once she was in the building it was a habit to keep her head down and get to her room as quickly as possible. She’d found that the less interaction she had with people the fewer things her mother had to lecture her about. Her social interactions were always lacking in some way and she could never be certain what her mother would latch onto.

When they entered the apartment Lila noticed Marinette frowning as she looked around. She couldn’t really blame her after seeing her house. The apartment was clean bordering on sterile due to the service her mother had come in daily. There weren’t any personal touches either. No pictures, no nicknacks, nothing that said people actually lived here. She didn’t really think about it. It had been this way as long as she could remember.

“Your place is nice…” Lila actually grinned as she watched Marinette try to come up with something good to say about it. “Lot’s of natural light.” Lila let out a snort of amusement. The girl was the essence of cheerful and that was all she could come up with. It was a bit sad really.

“My room’s this way.” When they entered Marinette perked up immediately. Lila could only assume it was due to all the pictures on the walls since it was the only real difference between here and the rest of the house.

“Wow, these are amazing! Do you collect them?”

“They’re not that good. Just pictures I’ve taken to remember where I’ve been.” She liked taking pictures, especially of nature. She found it soothing and having something to look back on made her feel a little less disconnected. Marinette was staring at her in what looked like awe.

“You took all these?” Lila just nodded. “These are amazing! I’ve seen professional photographers whose work doesn’t look this good.” Even knowing Marinette was just being nice, Lila couldn’t help but bask in the complement for a moment. But only for a moment.

“So what exactly should I be packing? I’ve never done the whole sleepover thing before.” Suddenly Marinette was looking at her like she’d kicked a puppy and she couldn’t figure out why.

“You’ve never had a sleepover? Ever?” Lila just shook her head. Wasn’t that what she’d just said? “Oh my gosh! We have so much to make up for. Obscene amounts of junk food and games and movies and makeovers and ghost stories and-” She just kept going. Lila had no idea what she was rambling about and it didn’t answer her question at all. Marinette finally paused to take a breath and she was able to break in.

“Okay, but what should I actually pack?” Marinette paused to think it over. The expression on her face seemed far too serious for such a common question.

“Your most comfy pajamas, whatever you want to wear tomorrow, and a toothbrush. I’ll take care of everything else.” Well that sounded slightly ominous. Regardless, she packed what she was told along with all her medications. Dumping those in the bag got a strange look from Marinette, but she wasn’t certain why. Maybe it was just how many there were. In less than ten minutes they were back out on the street, headed towards the bakery.

“Lila!”

“Shit.” She said the word under her breath as she looked behind her. Of course it would be Alya. They’d been on the street less than five minutes, only her luck could be that bad. She tried to use her body to block Marinette but she wasn’t quick enough. Alya’s expresion turned sour as she tried to reach around Lila.

“I thought we made it clear that we wouldn’t tolerate you bullying Lila anymore!” Lila grabbed the girls wrist before she could grab or slap Marinette. That stunned her enough to let Marinette get some space.

“You touch her again I’ll break the offending appendage.” Lila didn’t recognize her own voice in that deep threatening tone, but Alya just rolled her eyes.

“This is why we didn’t tell you what we were doing. You’re too nice and let people like her get away with anything.” She wanted so badly to just slap some sense into the girl but honestly she didn’t think it would work.

“I’m not nice, and you’ll find out exactly how not nice if you don’t stop harassing Marinette.”

“But if we don’t do something she’ll just keep bullying you!” Lila could only sigh. How many times was she going to have to have this conversation.

“Marinette is not now, nor has she ever bullied me. Which I already told you.” Alya let out a patient sigh, like she was explaining something simple to a small child. Yeah, someone was going to get hit before this conversation was over.

“She’s constantly calling you a liar and trying to turn everyone against you. Why would she do that?” Yep, the kindergarten teacher tone was definitely a good way to piss her off. Lila, of course, defaulted to sarcasm.

“Oh gee, I don’t know maybe because I was lying?” Alya looked like she was about to argue but Lila just kept going. “If you had bothered to look up literally anything I said you would know that.”

“An absence of proof is not proof of absence.” It took a minute for the words to penetrate as Lila was just getting even more annoyed by Alya’s self righteous tone but when they did she had to stop herself from lunging at her.

“Are you saying that you looked up my claims, found absolutely no proof and still took my word over Marinette’s?” Her voice was soft, more because her throat felt like it was closed in rage than anything else.

“There wasn’t any proof that you were lying either.” Alya’s smug tone finally snapped something inside her.

“Have you lost your damn mind?! Jagged stone has said in multiple interviews that he doesn’t even like cats. And in what universe would my mother’s PR team not have it in the news that I do charity work? She’s a public figure Alya, anything that can make her look good would have press releases for days. That in and of itself proves that I was lying.” The girl seemed to ponder this for a moment before she sent a glare to Marinette.

“What did you threaten her with to make her agree with you?” Knowing that she’d been right about who Alya would blame for this was a small consolation.

“Lila you need to calm down.” Marinette’s voice was soft, soothing even but she was in no mood to pay attention.

“I will not calm down! This wanna be reporter couldn’t find the truth if she fell into a river of it. You should consider a career in fiction by the way since anyone with journalistic integrity will simply laugh you out the door.” Alya was still glaring at Marinette, like all this was her fault. What was wrong with people? Marinette actually grabbed her arms and forced Lila to face her.

“Please. You really need to calm down. Just breathe with me okay? You don’t want to get Akumatized again.” Those words acted like ice water. Yes, this was beyond stupid, but it wasn’t worth that. She calmed her breathing as Marinette asked but made sure to keep a line of sight on Alya as well. There was no telling what someone like her would do at this point.

“We should head back to your house, your parents will start to worry.” She had no idea if that was true or not but she hoped it would get Alya to back off. Pretty much everyone agreed that Marinette’s parents were great people, but they were also scared shitless at the thought of pissing them off. After their talk earlier she understood why. It did the trick too. Alya mumbled something about finding out what kind of dirt Marinette had on her so Lila could stop pretending she’d been lying as she left at a brisk walk. She’d read about willful ignorance but she’d never expected to encounter it to this degree. She was starting to hope it did have something to do with Hawkmoth, but considering some of the things people were willing to believe she wasn’t very optimistic.

AO3 Beginning Previous Next

Ko-Fi

Tag List

@readeracctagmepls @aestheticnpoetic @akana-sama @schrodingers25 @runestarchild @paradoxal-occurance @heaven428 @animegirlweeb @deepestobservationwombat @iggy-of-fans @yin-390 @thehufflepuffranger-blog @trippingovermyfeet @misslenamooney

#miraculous ladybug #marinette dupen chang #lila rossi #lila redemption #ooc #salt

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sanderssidesfanfiction · 3 years

Text

If There’s a Place I Could Be - Chapter Seventy Three

If There’s a Place I Could Be Tag

November 30th, 2001

“You boys have a lot of explaining to do!” Grace snapped at Emile and Remy the second they walked in the apartment building.

“What? Why?” Emile asked. “Everything okay, Grace?”

“There was a woman screaming for the two of you all day on Thanksgiving,” Grace said with a scowl. “I couldn’t get a wink of sleep that morning.”

Remy paled but Emile just grabbed Remy’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “I’m sorry, Grace. I didn’t realize that woman might come looking for us while we were out of town, but I should have.”

Remy was trembling as Grace muttered a dark, “Don’t let it happen again,” walking away.

“Should we file a restraining order?” Emile muttered to Remy.

“Maybe we should just move,” Remy mumbled back.

October 16th, 2002

Remy stared at the ceiling of the bedroom, eyes wide open and mind racing. Emile was curled into his side, sleeping soundly, but Remy couldn’t catch a wink of sleep. He glanced at the clock and watched the seconds tick by for a while, before turning to look at his boyfriend. Emile looked so at peace, and it made Remy a little jealous. He had a small nightmare about his mother and now he couldn’t get back to sleep.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Remy made his way out of the bed without waking up Emile, and padded out to the living room. He glanced outside the windows, just to make sure his mother wasn’t around, and let out a low breath. He was being ridiculous, of course his mother wouldn’t be here. She had gotten the message to leave him alone for the time being, and she hadn’t been back here since...the holidays, where Emile and Remy had been visiting Emile’s family anyway.

Remy moved away from the windows and to the kitchen, pouring himself a glass of water. He felt wide awake, but he knew he needed at least a little sleep if he wanted to be functional at work later today...tomorrow? No, later today, it was past midnight.

Drinking the water down, Remy wandered over to the couch after putting the glass in the sink, and curled up on a corner of the couch, grabbing a book to read. The visibility wasn’t great, but there was just enough light through the windows that Remy could read the words on the page.

As he read, he could feel his nerves calming little by little, and the next thing he knew, he could hear snickering above him. He blinked blearily to find it was the early morning, and Emile was standing over him, staring at him with both amusement and bemusement warring on his face. “Comfy?” Emile asked.

Remy stretched and groaned. “Not really,” he said. “But I couldn’t sleep.”

Emile frowned. “What woke you up?”

“I dreamt about my mother again,” Remy sighed. “She had come back here, with Toby in tow, and the two of them were arguing that I should leave you and come ‘back home.’ And I know Toby would never do that in real life, because he cares about me too much, but the scary thing was that my mother could very well do that. And sure, we dodged her last holidays, but what about this year? We’re not heading to your family’s place, we agreed.”

Emile frowned. “I mean, if she shows up we can call the cops,” he said simply. “I know that’s not super comforting, but I’ve been planning to ask you something anyway, and now seems like as good a time as any.”

“Okay...?” Remy asked. A pit of dread was building in his stomach that he couldn’t explain.

“Would you want to move someplace bigger? With more space?” Emile asked. “Obviously, it wouldn’t be right away. But sometime soon. Would that help you sleep easier?”

“I...” Remy was embarrassed at his answer. “Yeah, probably...”

“No shame in that. We can look at townhouses in the area and see if anything jumps out at us,” Emile said with an easy shrug. “Maybe move after the new year.”

“And we wouldn’t have to pay rent anymore, just a mortgage,” Remy said with a small, wry smile.

“Pretty much!” Emile chirped. “Now, I think you need some coffee in your system, and I know you need a shower, so how about we start getting ready for the day and continue this talk when we don’t have to worry about me getting to classes and you getting to work?”

“Okay, okay,” Remy said, holding his hands up in surrender and heading to the kitchen to start the coffee maker. “One quick question, though: how much of the mortgage, in theory, would I be able to cover? Because I can cover half of the rent just fine, but a house is gonna be more expensive.”

“Honest answer?” Emile asked. “I don’t know. It’s gonna depend on the house we get, and the loans we get to get the house.”

Remy pulled a face. “Great. I don’t want you paying for the whole thing, Emile, that’s just not fair!”

“Relax, Rem. I could pay the mortgage and you could pay the bills, if that makes you feel a little more even,” Emile said. “But we’re in this together for the long haul. I don’t mind paying more of the mortgage than you, when it’s pretty clear we’re going to be staying together for a long time, if not, you know, the rest of our lives.”

“Oh, God, the rest of our lives,” Remy laughed. “That’s honestly a scary thought.”

“Why?” Emile asked. “I just assumed that was what we’d do?”

“No, no, it’s what I assume, too,” Remy rushed to assure. “I just...don’t really think about what that means too much, and when I do, it scares me. Not the thought of ‘tying myself down’ to one person, or whatever crap straight people say about getting married, but...the prospect of that not actually happening. What would happen if we didn’t stay together forever.”

“Well, if we both assume that we’re going to stay together, then there’s no worries,” Emile said. “Because I don’t want to leave you and you don’t want to leave me. So neither of us will be forced to leave.”

“I...guess so...” Remy said slowly.

“But if it’s a scary thought, I don’t want to force you to think about it,” Emile waved off. “And you still need to shower before your coffee is ready.”

Remy stuck his tongue out at Emile but went to take a shower. Internally, his mind was reeling, trying to put pieces of this puzzle together. Remy didn’t want to leave Emile, and Emile didn’t want to leave Remy. The fear of them not being together one day was unfounded, so why was he so scared?

As he stepped into the shower spray, Remy hummed and felt his muscles relax. It was a good question. Was it because that while they would stay together, it wasn’t technically permanent? They couldn’t get married, because no one would marry two men to each other. But you didn’t need the promise of marriage to love someone, right? Right. But...love wasn’t permanent, was it? Someone could say they loved someone and then turn around and dump them on the spot just because the spark wasn’t there anymore.

Emile and Remy had worked hard to make sure their sparks turned into a fireplace that kept going even when they couldn’t constantly tend to it, though, didn’t they? They had worked hard at their love. And yet Remy was still scared of losing Emile. Why?

Well...Toby and Remy loved each other as brothers. They had been inseparable for a long time. And now neither knew where the other one was. Remy had thought Vanessa had loved him, until she went off to college. And if he really wanted to go digging deep...Mom always said she loved him and then would turn around and act like he didn’t exist if he did something she didn’t like. Heaven forbid he break one of the rules, too. Then he’d get punished and have his mom say it was “for his own good” and that she loved him still. People in his life who said that they loved him no matter what were rarely telling the truth.

...That was depressing. But it also explained a lot. Remy nearly jumped out of the shower as soon as he was done, hollering, “Hey, Emile! I know where all my commitment issues stem from now!”

Emile opened the door to the bathroom just as Remy was wrapping a towel around his waist and Remy yipped. “Hey! No! Door closed!”

“Sorry, sorry!” Emile exclaimed, closing the door.

Remy walked out, dirty clothes in hand as he huffed. “There’s this great new thing called ‘knocking,’” he quipped.

“We’ve seen each other in less, I thought you wouldn’t mind,” Emile sighed, following Remy into the bedroom as Remy tossed his dirty clothes in the hamper and got new ones out. “Where do your commitment issues stem from?”

“Big shocker, you’re never gonna guess,” Remy said drily, facing away from Emile as he changed and said, “It’s my family. All of ‘em.”

“Wait. Even Toby?” Emile asked, and he sounded genuinely shocked.

“Well, Toby is a reason, but he’s not the reason,” Remy said. “He’s just...one nail in the coffin. But Vanessa said she loved me until she went off to college. Toby said he loved me and he’d never lose touch with me and then we did. And my mother said she loved me all the time and then turned around and treated me like something to be scraped off her shoe and discarded. I’ve never really had a steady sense of being loved in my life. So when someone says they love me forever, my brain says they don’t really mean forever, and I wait for them to drop me like everyone else always had.”

Emile stared at Remy in shock. “That is horrifying and insightful at the same time,” he said simply.

Remy shrugged and walked to the kitchen getting his morning coffee with a happy sigh. “Yeah. But I know the reason, so hopefully I can work past it now, you know?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Emile said. “That’s good. Tangentially related to that: would you ever want to get married to me?”

“If it was legal, yeah,” Remy said. “Sort of cements the idea that we would never leave each other into place. Why?”

“Because I might be low-key planning a wedding to invite all of your family to and promptly assassinate them,” Emile said simply.

Remy laughed. “I know you’re serious, Emile, but please don’t actually kill them? I don’t want to marry you only for you to spend life in prison.”

“Oh, all right, I’ll spare them for you,” Emile said simply. “But just say the word and they’re dead.”

Remy laughed more and Emile actually cracked a smile, which, considering their current topic of discussion, was surprising. “All seriousness, though,” Emile said. “You would marry me?”

“Emile, I’d propose to you if I knew there was a chance we could get married legally,” Remy said simply. “There’s no chance right now so I’m not planning on saving up for a ring, but that doesn’t mean I won’t in the future.”

“And that doesn’t scare you?” Emile asked.

“Hm? Oh, no, it terrifies me,” Remy said. “But I know the ‘why’ so we can work on it together. And once we have the chance to marry each other, I’ll have that existential crisis. For now, I’m just happy getting to be your boyfriend.”

Emile offered Remy a smile. “You know, when we first met I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t be caught dead calling anyone your boyfriend, even if you said you were gay.”

“Well, I would have seen it as a safety issue, especially if that guy wasn’t out to everyone yet,” Remy said simply. “But I’m learning that here is safe. And that’s a good thing, you know? I won’t immediately die if I say I’m attracted to someone.”

“Always a plus,” Emile said. “So. We get a house, we hopefully get engaged and we get married when it’s legal, anything else we should plan for?”

“Should we plan for one of your sperm donor kids showing up at our door?” Remy asked.

Emile burst out laughing. “I don’t think so. The chances of anyone using that sample are so small that the chances of them existing, let alone existing in a bad home life seem infinitesimal.”

“Okay, so house, engagement, marriage. Maybe my own shop. Anything else?” Remy asked.

Emile shrugged. “Me kissing you within the next five minutes?”

Remy grinned. “Only if you’re willing to stand my coffee breath.”

Emile laughed and gave Remy a long, loving kiss. “Somehow, I don’t mind,” he murmured.

#if there's a place i could be #sanders sides fanfiction #remile #emile picani #ts sleep

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dangan-happy · 3 years

Note

(Having no self-control makes you a tough galoot, like me!) This is for Kaito, Leon, and Mondo, but anyone else who feels they can help is free to chime in! (TW For discussion of current events and parent issue related conversation)

Hi guys. I've been hella stressed lately, and it's just been getting to much for me. My class work is getting seriously out of hand, I'm constantly ignored by my parents in favor of my younger siblings to a concerning level, and I've been slowly isolating myself from all my real life friends. I've been struggling really hard in keeping my work-life balance normal, and its really hard to reach out for help when I'm either berated or ignored by my parents. The only one who seems like they could help is my older sibling, but I don't want to be a burden to them with my problems. Could I please get some advice on how to better interact with the people around me, how to destress myself, and how to try and maintain a healthy working habit without overworking myself? A hug and just someone to talk to would be really nice, sorry to come in here such a drag. Thanks so much for reading this and helping me feel like someone cares!

Course ya can have a hug, kiddo! I ain’t gonna turn down someone whose feeling like shit... when I feel like shit, all I want is a hug. Just someone to comfort me, yknow? Anyway, enough about me, now onto you.

Your parents are bein’ real dicks, not paying attention to ya. You ain’t gonna be a burden just by asking for help or, at least, ya shouldn’t be. They should pay attention to both their kids equally, not just the younger ones. I think ya gotta realise that ya friends are some of the most important people to you, they'd probably love to be there for you. Please don’t wreck ya relationships because of work, my Kyoudai, he's a workaholic and I gotta force him to take breaks. Maybe you need to keep someone like that.

And - I ain’t that good at working, but I am good at destressing! Now, I’m guessin’ you can’t go for a motorbike ride with ya gang? Right, so maybe a hot drink and a book? That’s what Taka likes... or, a warm bath ‘n some chocolates? Just, get warm and watch ya favourite movie or tv show. Let yourself relax and not think for a while.

As for the overworking, take breaks between working. Time yourself, ya get me? Something like thirty minutes work and then a thirty-minute break? Summat just to keep time moving... just let yourself relax and talk to people sometimes. Take some self-care, kiddo. You deserve it.

Yo. I’m sorry to hear that your class work has been getting out of hand, I know exactly how you feel. (So does mod 11037!) Your parents ignoring you ain’t right either, that’s uncool of them, they shouldn’t be showing obvious preference for your siblings over you.

Balancing work with life is really difficult, I give you props for trying your best to do so. Not everyone attempts to try that. Hey, hey. You aren’t a bother to your older sibling, at least I would hope so. If they can help you, I really suggest you talk to them when they aren’t busy, you never know.

Interacting with people is tough, taking it slow is the best method. Try putting yourself out there the most that you can, find others that have common interests, you can always connect with others through mutual likes. Meditation is a great way to destress, it calms your nerves and listening to guided meditation can help you focus on getting rid of any negative feelings. Now healthy working habits…it’s best to make sure you stay hydrated of course, maybe cutting down on certain foods that you don’t really need to eat daily. I’m not really good at that kind of stuff, I’m not saying you need to stop eating things like sweets though so take that last bit of advice with a pinch of salt.

Don’t worry about asking for some help. It’s no drag at all, the only thing that’s a drag is your parents ignoring you. That’s seriously uncool of them and I’m still upset to know they’re doing that…but, I can give you all the hugs you want. I love giving you guys hugs! Really makes me happy to know that someone out there is feeling even a bit better because of what I have to say.

Hey, don't worry about it! You're not a drag at all! This an advice blog, and it doesn't matter how much of a drag your ask might be, we're here to read it and help. Yeah, you sound like you have what I've heard be called "Quarantine Syndrome." Becoming a social hermit, yeah all that stuff's coming from the pandemic crap. Man, that's really unfair that your parents to treat you like that. You deserve so much more respect, and it sucks that they aren't listening to your problems. If anything, you should try talking to them about this. Make sure they're aware what they're doing is hurting you at the least.

As hard as it is, my recommendation for the friend thing is to put yourself out there. You might have to be the one to start conversations. I know it's a real drag, but this is a good way to ensure that you get to talk to irl friends more. Make a group chat or message people individually. You could try setting up group calls, or just playing online games together or something. Alright, the school/work thing is way too relatable. But hey, I got an idea for that too!! You might wanna set up schedules for stuff. Make time for each thing, and kind of organize your day so you can get everything done that you need to. I think organizing everything might help keep you on track a little more, so maybe give that a shot! If you think your older sibling can help you, then yeah, go for it! You deserve to get the help you need, and you're not a burden ok? Reach out to them and see how it goes, and you never know, that might end up helping a lot.

Ok, so here's some tips for destressing. If you just wanna zone out, you could find some ambient music on youtube then watch live space wallpapers. They're really pretty and relaxing...or maybe that's just a me thing. Anyways, make sure you have some time to do the things you enjoy to stop yourself from getting burnt out. You might want to set time for this in your schedule too! Alright, did I get it all? I think I did! Yup, you can get a hug too! It's no problem ok, I'm glad I can make you feel like people care, because they do!! Feel free to shoot me an ask whenever, and I'll always be down to talk to you. Take care bro!

#danganronpa #danganronpa roleplay blog #ask #mondo owada #leon kuwata #kaito momota #mod mondo #mod 11037 #mod kokichi

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queenofmoons · 4 years

Text

The King of New York

for @geekinthecorner by @dredfulhapiness (for @friendly-neighborhood-exchange)

on AO3

rating: general

relationship: Peter Parker & Tony Stark

characters: Tony Stark, Peter Parker, Pepper Potts, Morgan Stark, May Parker, Happy Hogan

summary: Tony shrugged. “We could go sometime,” he said, putting a book on the shelf.

Peter blinked. “Huh?”

“Yeah, Morgan’s old enough to sit still that long, and Pepper’s been wanting to go, so you and May might as well come along.” He said it so casually. 'You might as well come see a Broadway show with us' like the price of two tickets wouldn’t equal one of Peter’s Midtown scholarships.

Peter found the playbills shoved in a box eloquently labelled hall closet shit. They were splayed amongst yearbooks and coats, and a few puzzles that looked like they had been collecting dust for years before the move.

The covers on a lot of them were cracked, either with age or mismanagement. The pages were dog-eared, or the layers of the pages were separating.

“You saw Music Man on Broadway?” Peter held one of the Playbills up, on the cover, a young boy was playing the trombone.

Tony looked up from where he was loading up the bookshelf across the room. He squinted to see what Peter was holding up, then realization crossed his face. “Ah,” he said, face returning to normal, “Yeah, my mom was into all that theater crap.” He waved his hand.

Peter shuffled the mini-stack of Playbills. Les Miserables, Merrily We Roll Along, Starlight Express, Sunday in the Park with George, Chess, Singin’ in the Rain, Carrie.

“You went a lot,” Peter said, flipping through the pages to look at old ads for cologne or hair care products.

“We needed something to do when my dad was working out of town.”

Peter continued flipping through the stack. Some of them were newer: The Humans, and Jersey Boys, and--

“You’ve seen Hamilton?” Peter held that playbill up, too. Instead of the normal yellow Playbill logo, the top was rainbow. He’d seen it in June.

“Huh?” Tony frowned, like he was thinking. “That’s the rap one, right? Yeah, it was Pepper’s Christmas gift one year.”

Peter stared at him, eyes wide. “And?”

“And?” Tony raised an eyebrow.

Peter rolled his eyes. “How was it?”

Tony shrugged. “It was fine,” he said. “Long.”

“Long?” Peter balked at him. “It’s Hamilton.”

“It’s overrated. The main character sucked.”

Peter clicked his tongue. “Money is wasted on the tasteless,” He said dramatically, clutching the playbill to his chest.

Tony shrugged. “We could go sometime,” he said, putting a book on the shelf.

Peter blinked. “Huh?”

“Yeah, Morgan’s old enough to sit still that long, and Pepper’s been wanting to go, so you and May might as well come along.” He said it so casually. You might as well come see a Broadway show with us like the price of two tickets wouldn’t equal one of Peter’s Midtown scholarships.

“Oh,” He said, rubbing the back of his neck. “That sounds like a lot of fun, but I’m not sure that we can--”

“I’m paying for it,” Tony said before Peter could even finish the sentence.

“Oh, that’s really kind, but I couldn’t--”

“I’m paying for it,” Tony repeated, still half-focused on putting Pepper’s books on the shelf in the right order. She had a certain way she wanted them, and Peter was decently sure Tony was putting them on the shelf wrong. He was decently sure Pepper separated by author rather than subject matter. Peter kept his mouth shut. If Tony wanted to unpack the apartment so poorly, that was on him. “-- did you hear me?”

Peter snapped his attention away from the bookshelf. “Sorry, what?”

“I said pick a show. I’ll get us tickets.”

—

Peter spent a long time mulling over the offer. It wasn’t the kind of gift he’d normally accept (too expensive and fancy), but it also wasn’t the kind of opportunity he got often (Broadway was highly inaccessible even for people who lived in New York).

He’d opted not to bring it up again. He’d leave the offer in limbo.

He thought that would be the end of it.

“So, Peter,” Pepper said. She was eating a sandwich over the kitchen sink, her tablet lit up on the counter beside it. “Which musical are we seeing?”

“Uh,” Peter said, cocking his head. There was a smear of mayo at the corner of Pepper’s lips. “What?”

“Tony said you wanted to see a show,” She said. “What are we seeing?”

“Oh, um…” Peter looked between Pepper and the door to the garage. “You know, I haven’t put much thought into it.”

But clearly Tony had, because he’d told Pepper. Peter had thought the conversation a throwaway, but…

“Well, let one of us know,” Pepper said. “It sounds fun. We haven’t gone since Morgan was born.”

—

Peter had a list of excuses as to why he couldn’t accept the offer.

“It’s a bad idea for both of New York’s biggest heroes to be preoccupied for the night,” he pointed out over dinner. He spoke with his hands, the meatball on the end of his fork wobbling dangerously.

“We’re both preoccupied right now,” Tony deadpanned.

“Our phones aren’t off,” Peter answered. “Friday is constantly scanning news systems. I mean, if something happens while we’re at a show--” he said at a show in the same voice one would say at key largo.

“Bruce owes me a favor,” Tony said. “I’ll ask him and to babysit if we need, and I’ll ask Rhodey to keep an eye on the city for a night. Pick a show.”

“What if the show’s not worth the money?” Peter asked during a late night. Harley was curled up in the corner, his jacket being used as a pillow against the wall, a book open on his chest. He was snoring softly. Peter spoke softly enough not to wake him.

Tony shrugged. “Then it’s not,” he said. “Kid, I’m a billionaire. I can afford to hate a musical. Just pick a show.”

“What if the public sees all of us out together?” Peter asked as he held Morgan’s bike seat steady. She was pedaling along, shaky. Not quite sturdy enough for Peter to let go yet. “They might make connections. Figure out I’m… Y’know.” He motioned like he was firing webs.

“I treat my employees to stuff like that all the time,” Tony said. He spun the disconnected training wheel. It squeaked. “Well, Pepper does. I just happen to be there sometimes.”

“And my aunt just happened to come along?”

“Your aunt is dating the head of security,” Tony reminded him. “Pete, it’s fine. Just do me a favor and--”

“Pick a show,” Peter finished. “Got it.”

There were a lot of options. Peter’s eyes scanned the billboards. He sat on a roof overlooking Times Square, sizing up the different shows being advertised. The usual shows were there, Wicked, and Chicago, and Phantom of the Opera. He chewed on his sandwich. Chicago and Phantom weren’t exactly age appropriate for Morgan.

They could see one of the Disney princess musicals, he considered. It would be safe for Morgan, and probably fun for the adults. It felt like a waste, though, to pay so much money to see a story and hear songs that they all already knew, Morgan especially.

He pulled his mask down, and dropped down to the ground to toss out his sandwich wrapper, still hung up on his paradox of choice.

“Wanna see a show tonight?” Someone shoved a flyer into Peter’s hands.

“Uh,” he said, because he was clearly not a tourist. He looked down and, yep, his spider suit was still there. When he looked up, the guy was already peddling his flyers to a different group of passing pedestrians.

He was just going to toss it. That is, until the title caught his eye.

“It’s another historical musical,” Tony said, unenthused, while flipping through the program.

“And it’s Disney,” May said, pleased.

Tony sat to Peter’s right, Morgan on his left. Around them was the murmur of people waiting for the show to start.

“It’s a good show,” Peter promised Tony. “And it’s not too old for Morgan.”

“And it’s about… newspapers?”

“Christian Bale is in the movie,” Peter supplied.

“Batman?!” Tony asked.

“I would have said Patrick Bateman,” Pepper said.

“That’s a musical, too,” Peter chimed in.

“Weirdest medium ever,” Tony said, and Peter couldn’t even bring himself to argue. He was right. It was.

“Imagine the business card scene, but sung,” May said. Happy snorted.

“What?” Morgan asked, and Peter shook his head at her.

“Look, Newsies is a classic,” Peter said in a final defense of his choice. “It’s about a band of misfit kids taking down the big bad evil millionaire.”

“Millionaire?” Tony raised an eyebrow.

“Watch it, Stark,” Peter said. “They’re coming for you next.”

Tony didn’t get a chance to retort. The lights dimmed, and an announcement was made, and the overture played and Peter settled into his seat, content, and also thrumming because he could feel the strings rattle his muscles and oh my god he was seeing a Broadway musical.

—

“So, what did you think?” Tony fell into step with Peter, just behind the rest of their group. He put a hand in the middle of Peter’s shoulders. Ahead of them, Morgan was holding May’s hand and jabbering excitedly about the tap number. Happy and Pepper were debating dinner plans.

“It was great!” Peter said, and okay maybe he was a little starry-eyed. They stepped out onto the New York streets and it smelled like garbage, and sweat, and the subway, and home.

Peter pulled Tony in for a hug. “Thanks, Mr. Stark.”

Tony patted him on the back awkwardly. “No problem, kid,” he said.

They pulled apart and caught up to the rest of their family. The sky was a familiar blue-black, and the pavement shone with streetlights, and Rhodey hadn’t even been needed and Peter understood when Morgan called, from atop Happy’s shoulders, “I’M THE KING OF NEW YORK!”

#this was fun!!!! thank u for requesting theater stuff #what I wouldn't do to be seeing a broadway show rn #friendly neighborhood exchange #iron dad and spider son #my fic

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libraribear · 3 years

Text

2020 in Review

2020 is in the books. What a year. It seems a given that through life, some years will be good and some years will be bad, and for many 2020 was one of the bad ones. Globally, it feels like it was the worst year ever. Personally, I can’t go that far. So many people have it worse than I do, and I’m leery of writing this post because I don’t want to sound unsympathetic as I count my blessings (before going into the undeniably shitty, but FAR LESS shitty things than what some other people are going through).

Nonetheless, as part of a New Year’s Resolution to create more, I figured I’d polish up this blog and write more, so here’s my 2020: Good, Bad, and Ugly. This is a heckin’ long post so only read on... if you dare.

The Good

I never lost my job.

A lot of my academic colleagues did - basically everyone who had “temporary” or “adjunct” in their title was axed. By virtue of being temporary year-to-year faculty for five years, I was promoted to the tenure-track in 2019. I feel very badly for my colleagues, all who lost their job to circumstance, not merit. Six years ago I took a chance leaving a steady job with a newborn to pursue my goal of being an Academic Librarian. The job was a one-year temporary position with no guarantee of continued employment, and I worked hard, interviewed for my job twice in five years, and managed to hang on. It’s crushing to imagine what it would have been like to survive all that and get axed because of a pandemic, and I feel very badly for my colleagues who suffered that fate.

I got to spend most of the year working from home with my kids.

Before I get into “The Bad”, namely that keeping a five and six year old on task while working a full-time job is incredibly stressful, the good was that I got to watch one-year-old girl grow and grow and grow every day whereas my two boys were in daycare at that age. I got to spend a ton more time with the boys and my wife too.

My kids live in a school district with resources.

We’ve made a lot of strides in Distance Education, but it still isn’t ideal. I feel like my kids’ school district is doing the best they can to make it work. I feel extremely fortunate to live in a district where that was an option from the start, with full distance, hybrid, and in-person options. Not wanting to expose my kids or their teachers to any risk, we’ve gone full distance the whole time. we chose this to keep our kids as safe as possible, so I hope you’ll forgive me when I go into detail under The Bad as why it sucks for everyone involved. ;)

Ms. Bear and I started Doctoral Programs

File this one under “things I’d have never done if I knew the pandemic was going to be this much of a problem in Fall”, but it’s still a good thing - and definitely not the kind of thing I would do if it wasn’t free through my university. With Ms. Bear it’s more of a life-fulfillment thing and I’m happy that I can help her realize her dream.

The Bad

Distance Education Requires Training - Students Are Struggling

My college freshmen struggled to adapt to their first year seminar class and I attempted to make it as easy as possible for them to follow along, engage online, have second and third chances to turn in assignments... it didn’t matter. Elementary school students have it worse - my kids struggle to stay on task, and me and Ms. Bear do our best to keep them on task. I feel really bad for those kids whose parents can’t work from home or are too busy to stay on them and help them with distance education. I’m not anti-distance education by any stretch, but the pandemic forced a lot of people to switch to it relatively quickly and since distance education is by its nature very self-directed even with a good teacher/instructor, some people unused to this method really struggle.

I should note that none of this is meant as a criticism of the decision to go for distance education. Health is most important, period, and those politicians that are like “But think of the children, send them to school” - well, hold them back a year if it’s that bad. I repeated the first grade. It’s better than dying. I worry less about the kids’ educational attainment and more for those kids from bad homes where school is a safe haven/source of food. If you’re that worried about it pass some laws to help.

The Roof, The Roof, The Roof is leaking water

When you find a tiny leak in your roof, if you can afford it, pay the money and fix it. Don’t wait “because it’s a pandemic and we may need that money”. The money sat in my bank account until the the bedroom ceiling started to drop a few months later. Definitely the decision of 2020 I’d most like back.

2020 Was Not The Year to Reduce Stress.

I think everyone is running on fumes by the time they got to the end of this year. For my wife and I as young parents (can’t help that), full-time workers (gotta eat to live), and grad students (like I said above, if I had a do-over I’d DEFINITELY have waited until 2021, the pandemic represented the steady erosion of all the gains I made the past year. Anxiety? Back up. Overall level of physical fitness and nutrition? I was exercising and eating and feeling really healthy in March, but I eat (and feel) like crap now.

The Ugly

Misinformation, Misinformation Everywhere... and Politics

Misinformation is nothing new for a US Presidential Election year. But as a librarian whose job it is to promote information literacy, understanding which sources are indeed trustworthy and which are not, this election year was frankly, terrifying for me. I mean, if you know a source is trustworthy because of the standards and norms that are used to govern it, but people simply roll to disbelief it’s trustworthiness... I’m not sure how in the hell you get through to them. Lest this be construed as too political a post (I did get a little political above, hee), I’m going to stress that these information discernment skills that seem to be lacking are skills people on both Team Blue Donkey and Team Red Elephant lack. Add to that the psuedoscience, lack of fact-checking, and the whole “If it doesn’t agree with my worldview, I refuse to believe it” attitude illuminated by the pandemic and I’m not going to lie, this shit is terrifying to me. I’m hoping it’s just a phase we’re going through in America, but geez. I’m not a doom and gloomer, but this year was TOUGH in the whole “Faith in humanity’s ability to reason” department. I’ll listen to anyone’s political opinion if they back it up with well-researched sources and facts, but rather than driving closer to this goal, we’re heading in the wrong direction.

I should note that to me, it’s not just Team Red Elephant that has trouble discerning information, or is duplicitous. I need to make that clear. I definitely lean left and it’s not hard to see why - I mean, I’m a heckin’ librarian for crying out loud. But lying and misinformation or misconstruing facts? Some politicians may be more egregious offenders, but most politicians do that regardless of stripe. I feel politics are more like a teeter totter constantly switching up and down. We do ourselves a disservice when we believe everyone on our team is rational and level-headed and everyone on the other team is evil, stupid, irrational. There was a time when we could have discourse, and through disagreements we could at least learn from one another. I intensely understand the desire to make and justify political beliefs, but they’re not how we progress in a country that’s run the way the US is. Maybe it’s always been this way, but as I’ve aged I notice we have a lot more tendency to anoint a politician of our political stripe as a savior. Whatever happened to the old worldview that all politicians were lying dirtbags and though you might side with them, you could never fully trust them? It seems to have been turned on its head, I’m not sure how, to “Trust my side implicitly, DO NOT TRUST THE OTHER SIDE AT ALL.” That one side could be a bastion of truth and virtue and the other a bastion of evil and ugliness is, I’m not gonna lie, extremely unlikely.

Do as I say, not as I do. I got swept up in the political fervor myself with my D&D Friends - for a time we had a “Just Politics” channel to talk politics. That was a big mistake. Though no friendships were ended, that channel alone intensified my anxiety tenfold (MY FRIEND IS WRONG ON THE INTERNET! I HAVE TO SHOW THEM THE ERROR OF THEIR WAYS!) and... yeah. The BEST decision I made in 2020 was folding and walking away from the political discussion table - but it took me a few months of arguing and stressing to get there. I’ve reverted back to trying to do good for all people in my little corner of the world and the web by treating everyone respectfully and rationally unless they give me reason to do otherwise, at which point I’m far more likely to ignore you than engage with you. I hate that I have to do that, but it is what it is. If I talk politics, it’s privately with someone I know that is sane enough to safely distance from the chaos, or someone I trust implicitly. I won’t deny that it’s a very fascinating subject to me since politics is so ingrained into human nature, but good lord, what a minefield.

UGLY Bonus Edit (I always think of the coolest things to say right after I hit post, after all)

A last thought - whenever we’re confronted with a worldview we disagree with, whatever happened to asking the person why they feel that way or what they meant before immediately labeling them scum on Earth? We don’t even bother to fact check the people we loathe when honestly at worst you’re just confirming suspicions, at best you may even cause them to question why they believe what they believe? I can’t remember the last political or heated conversation I’ve seen where that happened. When I was fighting with my friends on “Just Politics” I don’t think I bothered to ask that often enough myself.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to making 2021 a better year than 2020. Happy New Year, everyone. Love and hope to you all.

#libraribear life #Happy New Year

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kusunogatari · 4 years

Text

[ ObiRyū October | Day Twenty-Five | Pent Up ] [ @abyssaldespair ] [ Uchiha Obito, Suigin Ryū, Nohara Rin, Hatake Kakashi ] [ Verse: Best Years of Your Life ] [ Vulgarity, blood ]

[ Previous ] [ Next ]

Why, why, why is it so hard to keep ahold of his temper…?!

So much more seems to grate at his patience than it used to when he was younger. Sounds, touches, even smells can start chipping at his mood, making him more and more agitated until something has to give. It’s like his brain has turned into a ticking time bomb, randomly exploding when just the right criteria are met.

Needless to say...it’s made most people wary of him. And now that he’s starting his senior year back in the district he once hailed from, he’s especially wary of being labeled dangerous, unstable, a freak.

He’s already embarrassed himself once. The pool party, barbeque, whatever that Rin invited him to ended in disaster when he had one of his seizures. Right in front of everyone...they all just stared in horror as he seized up, plunging into the pool.

But then the girl who lived there had dragged him up, spurring the rest of them into action. The damage, however, had already been done. By now he’s sure everyone already knows about it before he even steps foot into the high school this morning.

...he just has to stay calm.

Finding his locker, he ignores the dubious looks he gets, the whispers that seem to follow him. Even at the reformative school he’d been transferred to after his accident had seen him an odd one out, mostly due to his appearance...but his breakdowns and spasms hadn’t helped, either. By now it’s all just white noise, fiddling with the combination lock on his locker door.

“Hey!”

Half a second late, Obito realizes he recognizes that voice, if only vaguely. A turn shows the girl from yesterday...Ryū? Admittedly he remembers almost nothing about her - only that she used to tag along with Rin when they were younger, and how much harder that made getting the other girl alone.

...of course that doesn’t matter now. Rin’s with Kakashi, for...some reason.

He just blinks at her, watching her approach with her books clutched to her chest.

In turn, she offers a smile. “So, you made it. How are you feeling today?”

The question earns a reflexive tick of annoyance. He gets really sick of people asking him that, but...there’s a genuine concern in her expression most people tend to lack. Usually they’re more exasperated than actually worried. “...I’m fine. Stiff, but it’ll pass.”

“Ah, good...that must have been so scary…”

“I’m used to it. It’s been happening for five years.”

Further sympathy wilts her brows. “...that must be really tough.”

He doesn’t have an answer, simply grunting and opening the door once the lock gives way.

“Well...if you need anything, let me know! Maybe I’ll see you in some classes?”

“I doubt it. Most of mine are pretty low ones compared to a lot of seniors.” And surely she’s not at his held-back level. She seems pretty smart, from what he can tell.

There’s a small awkward pause. “Oh...well, maybe a club…? I’ve been in the theater club since I was a freshman. It’s a lot of fun! But there’s a lot of others too, if you’re looking for something to do.”

Ugh, clubs...aren’t classes bad enough? “I’ll think about it.”

She seems to realize he’s getting annoyed. “Well...okay! I’ll, um...I’ll see you later, Obito. Have a good morning!”

He watches her go. Is she really one of those people that’s constantly peppy and good-natured? Isn’t that...exhausting? Well, whatever. He better get to first period. Last thing he needs is to be late on the first day. People are going to have enough reason to give him crap.

Thankfully he doesn’t have any confrontations on the way there, taking a back row seat and folding arms atop his desk to rest his chin. He’s barely been here ten minutes and he’s already sick of it.

...but he told his grandmother he’d try. She’s so eager to see him graduate from a proper school. All Obito can think is that he hopes she lives that long. She’s not exactly a spring chicken anymore. Out of everyone in his life right now...she’s his rock. The one person he never gets angry with, never gets upset by. Sachiko feels like the only reason he’s been keeping it together.

Even his old friends have clearly changed. Rin, while still friendly, seems a bit more...conscious about talking to him. Especially when Kakashi’s around. And Kakashi’s still quick to butt heads with him over practically nothing. Like yesterday with Rin’s invite to the party. It would have pissed him off...if Rin hadn’t rolled over for him so easily.

...he can’t expect them to be the same, but...he’ll admit, he’s not a fan of these changes. He knows things can’t be the same, but...even Rin no longer feels like a friend.

...maybe this whole ‘coming back’ thing was a mistake.

Morning classes pass in a bit of a fog, Obito in no way motivated to pay much attention. He just wants to check off this day from what will surely be a very long list of days until the year ends. The sooner that gets here, the happier he’ll be.

Come lunch, he’s realizing he’s now going to have to confront a few things. One being the crowds, and the noise. Another being trying to find a seat

Cuz he knows no one’s going to want to sit by -

“Obito!”

Jolting a bit with his tray in hand, he spots Ryū waving at him from a table. Nearby, both Kakashi and Rin seem to hesitate.

That narrows his eyes...but he decides to sit anyway. If they’re going to treat him like a stranger, he’ll just do the same. He doesn’t need them. He doesn’t need anyone. They want to distance themselves from him? Fine.

Instead, he sits next to Ryū.

“How were your classes?”

“Boring. But about what I expected.” He pointedly avoids looking at the other pair, working on getting his food arranged on his tray. “You?”

“I already have homework in two classes, but...hopefully it won’t be too bad.” There’s a mild silence, Ryū seeming to notice the awkward air between the three former friends. “...what about you guys? Any hard classes this morning?”

“I had three AP classes but that’s usual,” Kakashi replies, also obviously ignoring Obito. “Schedule’s pretty full, but it’ll be fine. Need them for my college apps.”

Across from him, Obito scowls at the casual bragging.

“Rin?” Ryū gives a bit of a strained smile.

“Nothing too, uh...bad. Pretty typical. One homework assignment so far. Also not sure what club I want to join...I liked gardening club last year but apparently the damage to the greenhouse from that storm over the Summer means it’s cancelled for this semester at least.” Rin’s mouth falls into a disappointed frown. “So I dunno if I should wait, or...join something else in the meantime. Cuz depending on repairs and stuff, it might not happen at all.”

“Aww! That really sucks...you could join theater!”

At that, Rin gives a short laugh. “I...don’t think so. Not really the acting type, and...it’d be weird being there just one semester or one year. You guys are a pretty close-knit group, right?”

“Well, yeah. But we welcome new freshmen every year!”

“Mm...I’ll think about it.”

“What about you, Obito?” Ryū asks, turning to him. “Want to join any clubs?”

“Or you could play a sport!”

“Not sure a sport is a good idea with my condition,” Obito replies, making Rin balk.

“O-oh...right. Sorry…”

“Well, doing some kind of extracurricular activity is good for your educational resume,” Kakashi offers nonchalantly.

“Not sure my educational resume is really going to impress anybody, given the circumstances,” Obito retorts, looking annoyed.

“Doesn’t mean you should just give up.”

“I’ll do whatever the hell I want.”

“Hey, guys, it’s fine,” Ryū cuts in, a placating hand rising. “Everybody does high school differently. APs or not, clubs or not, it’s whatever.”

“Yeah I only got into one AP this year,” Rin confirms with a nod before shooting Kakashi a look.

All the while, Obito tries to keep a hold on his temper. He can tell Kakashi is just trying to get a rise out of him. And while he already has pent up anger concerning the other boy, he doesn’t want to let it win.

So he instead focuses on deep, even breaths while the girls try to diffuse the situation. Now, if only it weren’t so loud in the cafeteria...it’s grating on his nerves.

“I’m gonna go get ready for class,” Kakashi eventually relents, standing and taking his half-empty tray with him.

“Kakashi -!” Looking a bit flabbergasted, Rin tries to call him back to no avail. “...I dunno what’s gotten into him today!”

“Just his typical asshole self,” Obito mutters. “Has to boss everyone else around, has to make himself look good when no one gives a shit.”

“I think he is worried about what you’re going to do after graduation,” Rin replies, looking a little nervous. “I mean...you’ve got an uphill battle ahead of you, given your...um...setbacks.”

Obito’s expression only sours, temper fraying further. “Well he doesn’t have to be such a shithead about it.”

“...it’s just...going to take some adjusting, y’know? Everyone...being back together. We’ve all changed, right?”

That does it. Appetite ruined, Obito stands without a word and dumps the rest of his food, tossing the tray into the wash pit.

Behind him, the girls both jolt in surprise. But only one gets up to follow him.

“Obito!”

He doesn’t stop, shoulders hunched and hands in his pockets as Ryū jogs to catch up.

“Don’t listen to Kakashi, he’s just -?”

“Just a massive prick and a pain in my ass,” Obito growls. He can feel the embers of his temper starting to flicker with flame.

“I’m sorry...you didn’t have to sit with them. I just figured -?”

“It wasn’t your fault. You -” You’ve been nothing but nice to me. “...Kakashi’s picked fights with me since we were kids. And...I’ve picked fights back. We’re just not meant to be around each other that much. Don’t worry about it.”

Managing to come around to his front, Ryū cuts off his path, expression guilty. “...still. I...should have read the room.”

“I didn’t have to sit there. It was my choice.”

“...well...tomorrow we’ll sit somewhere else, okay? That way it won’t happen again.”

Sighing, he stares at her. “...why are you being so nice to me?”

The question seems to take her aback. “W...why wouldn’t I?”

“Cuz no one else seems to want to.”

“Well everyone else are just a bunch of jerks. I know this is awkward...for everybody. And maybe Rin’s right, maybe things have changed, but…” She sighs. “...you still deserve to be treated kindly, and given a chance to meld back into things here. So I’m, at least, going to try to help you do that.”

It’s his turn to exhale, far more curtly than her. “...just pisses me off. Rin invited me yesterday, and then let Kakashi walk all over her. She just...abandoned me when she was the only reason I showed up! Then today she lets him say all that shit, and only stutters out excuses. She’s letting Kakashi blindside her.”

“...maybe she is. But...she might come around! You guys just...have to get reacquainted. And that’s not going to be easy. For now, I guess all you can do is...just try to be patient. See how things go. Maybe they’ll settle down, and...maybe they won’t. Only way to know is to try. In the meantime. I’m not going anywhere.”

For a moment he scoffs. She’s not going anywhere, is she? The person he knows the least out of this group? But...then again, maybe that’s a good thing. Whereas he has soured memories and expectations for Kakashi and Rin, Ryū is...a blank slate. Known only briefly. Vaguely.

And already making a good impression.

So despite his original intention to blow her off, he sighs. “...guess you’re right.”

“...I think for now, you guys should give each other some space. Kinda...ease into it, you know? I mean...five years apart is a long time. Trying to act like all that time didn’t pass will only make this more difficult. Take a little while for yourself. Get settled in overall, then you can worry about anything else.”

He considers that silently.

...that is until a pack of unruly freshmen make their way down the hall.

Loud, obnoxious, and clearly not yet learning any respect, they push through between the pair. Ryū, slighter in frame, stumbles back and slams into the wall, head knocking with a hollow thunk.

Something in Obito clenches.

“Watch it!” the ringleader taunts, pulling a face. That is, until Obito grabs him by the shirt front. “Whoa whoa whoa!”

“Apologize,” the Uchiha growls, ignoring the sudden attention they’re getting.

“Jesus man, you look like you got into a fight with a weed trimmer and lost! What the fuck is wrong with your face?”

Clutching her head, Ryū looks up with a wince before panicking.

“Funny, I was just going to ask you that. Cuz you look like a little prick that just got decked in the nose.”

“Wha-?”

With a crunch, Obito reels back and...does just that. The freshman falls to the floor hard, clutching at his face.

“What the fuck, man? What the fuck?!”

“You hurt my friend. Seems only fair you get a taste of your own medicine. And I’m really tempted to teach you a second lesson…!” His heartbeat is rushing in his ears, his whole body hot with anger. All he can focus on is the blood on this little asshole’s chin...and how much more he’d like to see.

“Obito, stop!” Ryū pulls at his arm, trying to waylay him.

“You’re gonna regret -!”

“Stop!” Desperate, Ryū instead steps right in his path, latching onto him tightly. Face in his chest, she clings arms around to his back.

He freezes.

“...don’t. It’s not worth it. He’s just some little punk. You’ve done enough!”

Blinking, Obito feels the heat receding. His tensed form slowly goes limp.

And all around him are staring eyes, whispering mouths, pointing fingers. But what tops it all off is seeing both Rin and Kakashi. The former stares in horror. The latter glowers.

A shaking seems to overcome him. It’s too much, he - he can’t -?

Urging Ryū aside, he flees.

Not one to give up so easily, she follows even as the warning bell rings.

Ironically, his hiding place is the storage room for theater club props.

“...Obito?” Navigating her way around the odds and ends, she finds him crouched in a corner of set pieces. “...hey…” Carefully, she takes a knee beside him. “You all right…?”

“N...no…”

She sighs before just...sitting beside him. “...this has been a really shitty first day, huh…? I’m sorry. How about we just...stay in here for a bit? Let things...settle down?”

“I’m gonna get in so much trouble…! First day back and I’ve already fucked it up! I just...I wanted…” To Obito’s frustration, his voice starts breaking and tears sting at his eyes despite rubbing at them with the backs of his hands. “...I wanted...to get through this. F-for my...for my grandma. She wants me to…”

At that, Ryū softens, laying a hand gently on his arm. “...it’s gonna be okay. I’ll tell the staff what happened. Because to be fair...I did get hurt…”

At her sheepish smile, he looks over, sniffling. “...you okay?”

“My head kinda hurts, but...I’ll be fine. Freshmen are just...brats. Punching them might not be the best way to get them to shape up, but...it is a way,” she admits with a hint of a giggle.

“...I got angry. I shouldn’t have done that, but...I’m just so…!” His hands lift, to bury into his hair, pulling at it in frustration. “...I get so mad! I dunno why!”

Wilting again, Ryū leans against him softly. “If...I had to guess, it probably has to do with your condition. Did you...have any cranial trauma?”

“...yeah…”

“That can really mess with your emotions, depending on where it happened. People even develop new addictions or behaviors after they get hurt like that. But...you can get therapy for it. Maybe...that’s something you could look into?”

“We can’t afford it,” Obito counters bitterly. “...it’s just me and my grandma. She can’t…”

The thought trails off, and Ryū hums in response. “...well...maybe something will come along. But it sounds to me like this anger isn’t entirely your fault. A lot of it probably comes from the trauma you went through during your...your accident. But I bet you can overcome it…! It’ll just take time, and the right resources.”

Obito, knowing he can’t really access the latter, just stays quiet.

“...how do you feel now…?”

“...tired. Frustrated. But I’m not angry anymore. Not for now,” he adds with a sigh.

“That’s good, though! Think you can go back to class…?”

Another sigh, arms folded atop his bent knees to rest his chin. “...I dunno.”

“Then we’ll just stay here a little longer.”

“But you need to get to class.”

“This is more important.”

Obito’s brow furrows, watching as she stands up. More important?

“I’m really excited for the plays this year...we’re going to do Beauty and the Beast this Winter, and then Grease in the Spring! I hope I get good parts, since it’s going to be my last year…” Ryū looks over props from past productions, a fond smile on her face. “...it’s been a lot of fun. I’m going to miss it…”

“...can you do it in college?”

“Maybe. I dunno if I’ll have time, but...I’d like to. If all goes well, I’d like to go into nursing, like Rin. But theater and choir have made me really happy, too. They’re just...not really stable careers,” she adds sheepishly.

“...but they make you happy.”

“...they do.”

Breaking his gaze from her, Obito looks over the props around him. “...did you guys...build these?”

“Mhm. Well...I didn’t. We have people who work on props, or the lighting, or music. It’s not just actors, after all. But we all have a lot of fun.” She looks to him thoughtfully. “...I’d still say you’d enjoy joining us, if you want. Gives you a creative outlet, and you can make some friends! You don’t have to be an actor if you don’t want to. Maybe...stop in a few times, see if you like it? You can always quit if you don’t.” Ryū smiles at him. “But...maybe an outlet would be good for you. Something to think about and look forward to. Something...new. And fun!”

He mulls that over, looking unsure.

“...well, just think about it. We don’t have our first meeting until Wednesday - last period is cancelled so people can look at the clubs and pick one. Maybe you’ll find another one you can do instead, too!”

Almost immediately, Obito pushes that notion aside. If he’s going to do a club...it would probably be this one...if only because he’d already know someone in it. “...okay.”

For a while, Ryū finds some memorable pieces in the room, showing them off and recounting memories about them. Obito finds himself enthralled, glad for something else to think about.

...but all good things have to come to an end.

A knock sounds on the door, the pair of them looking up as the school secretary comes in. Her arms fold. “There you are. You’re both quite tardy to your next classes. And you’re to come to the office about a fight that happened during lunch period.”

Ryū tenses. “Obito wasn’t -!”

The woman holds up a hand. “A few witnesses said the freshman started things when he pushed you and injured your head, and that it ended when mister Uchiha punched the assailant. Both he and the freshman will be serving detention after school today. Guardians have already been called.”

Behind Ryū, Obito’s face falls. So...Sachiko already knows.

“Obito has a medical condition the school needs to take into account,” Ryū retorts. “Ignoring that will be grounds for discrimination for his disability!”

“You can discuss that with the principal,” the secretary retorts. “To the office. Both of you.”

To Obito’s surprise, Ryū glowers the whole way down, arguing quite haughtily with staff once they arrive. Jiraiya has already shown up, listening quietly to his daughter’s arguments.

“Obito shouldn’t be punished, he needs help! Punishing him won’t address the real problem and leave the possibility it happens again!”

“The school is not responsible for mister Uchiha’s health or disabilities,” the principal retorts, waving a hand. “If he has issues, they’re to be handled on his own time to ensure he attends school properly without resorting to violence.”

“And if he doesn’t have the means?”

“It’s still not the school’s responsibility. Obito’s job while here at school is to attend his classes and pass them, and refrain from poor behavior. If he can’t do that, we’ll have to remove him.”

Ryū bristles, but pauses as Sachiko is ushered into the room. Worry tightens the old woman’s face.

Obito’s head bows in shame.

Suddenly feeling overwhelmed, Ryū looks pleadingly to her father.

Glancing between everyone present, Jiraiya heaves a heavy sigh. “...the way I see it, we have a student on our hands that lacks the resources to be able to attend school as he is. Which means we need to get those resources squared away, so he can use the school his granny’s tax dollars pay for, and that he should have the right to use.”

The principal perks a brow.

“If we get the kid into therapy and his behavior improves, he can stay, right?”

“...correct.”

Arms folding over his barrel chest, Jiraiya simply replies, “Then that’s what we’ll do.”

Ryū’s expression brightens, Obito’s slack in shock.

“Oh, sir...you don’t have to -?” Sachiko lifts her hands, looking hesitant.

“Nonsense. Any friend of my daughter’s is a friend of mine. Friends help each other. We’ll get this little snag taken care of, and then everything’ll be fine.” He gives a cool, pointed look to Obito. “...right?”

“R...right.”

Looking exasperated, the principal waves them away. “Just...make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

The four of them then leave the office, Jiraiya talking to Sachiko as the teens idle uncertainly.

“...is he serious?”

“Mhm,” Ryū replies, smiling. “Dad helps a lot with stuff at the school - admittedly he’s...made a good amount of money. So he tries to give back. The party yesterday? That’s one of his ideas. He’s been doing it since I started school. He takes a lot of pride in the community, and maintaining it. I think yesterday already made him realize you need some help.”

“...I don’t -?”

She cuts off Obito’s retort with a hand on his arm. “It’s not pity. It’s help. A tool you can use to succeed. Besides, I’m sure he’ll find a way for you to make it up if you want. I know he hates mowing the lawn, so...expect him to wrangle you into something.” Her expression softens. “...it’s gonna be fine.”

Still looking conflicted, Obito just sighs. He’s not...used to this. How is he supposed to react…?

“Well, you two better get back to class,” Jiraiya then offers. “Sachiko and I are gonna hash some things out. You’ve still got your detention Obito, but that should be it. Just try and keep a lid on that temper until we get something figured out.”

“...yes sir.”

“Then off you scoot!” He ushers them down the hall.

“Well...guess I’ll see you later,” Ryū offers. “Think you’ll be okay?”

“...I guess.”

“I can wait after if you -?”

“No,” he cuts in firmly. “You...you’ve done enough.”

“...okay. Well, I’ll see you after class, then.” She gives a little wave, branching off down another hallway.

Obito watches her go.

“...thank you.”

Oof, this is very late OTL Almost finished it last night but I just...had a really bad day and an even worse night so I call it quits. Came back with a fresher mind and got it done. Still not 100% sure about it, but it’s done kjdfgjkdhfg I always struggle with modern and this one felt really hard to write, idk why. I’m not very good at writing grumpy characters kjfdjdhfg but I tried :’D Anyway I’ve got irl stuff to do so idk if I’ll get more done tonight or not, but I’ll try. Thanks for reading~

#obiryū october #abyssaldespair #uchiha obito #suigin ryū #nohara rin #hatake kakashi #best years of your life [ au ]#vulgarity //#blood //

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stupidheadwithablog · 4 years

Text

Robin Hood Chapter One

The area around my left eye was sore and it was starting to swell shut thanks to me getting punched there. I’d just beaten the crap out of some guy a year older than I am in the local library who thought it was a good idea to called me a selfish bitch simply because he somehow managed to found out that I’m still a virgin. Okay, technically it was my own fault that he’d found that out, but it’s not my fault his dumb self didn’t know the correct meaning of what a virgin is! Not only that, once I told him what it meant he said that it should be illegal for females over fourteen to be one! What the fuck!?!

Anyways, I’m sixteen, so I’m not even worried about still being a virgin. No one my age should, in my opinion. I told him that too, and that jerk said how his own father taught him how females are only good for being in the bed or in the kitchen.

I kind of feel bad for him, being brainwashed to believe those majorly outdated ideas by his own father. I feel bad for his mom too, if she’s still even with his father. I sure hope she isn’t still with a jerk like that.

It made me megapissed when he tried to force himself on me after insulting me for my opinions, so the way I see it is that I had no other choice but to beat him up for trying that shit on me.

I’d gotten banned from the library for a month while he’d gotten kicked out for life. It sucks for him since I’d seen him in there a bunch, but he really should have know better than to try something like that in a public area.

It would have been a lifetime for the both of us, but thankfully for me, my brother had the smart idea to record the whole fight on his phone. It was proof that I didn’t start it and was only fighting back as self defense, seeing as how I didn’t start fighting until after he’d pressed his lips on mine. I feel gross thinking about it. I thank whatever powerful force out there that’s keeping this planet together for planting the idea of phones having cameras into someone’s head.

The lower part of my left arm is a bit sore along with my eye, and there was a hand mark there thanks to him grabbing my arm there really tight when he’d forced his mouth on mine. My knee is sore too from when I’d kneed him in the privates after he forced me to kiss him and my knuckles are pretty sore and two of them on each hand are starting to bleed from all the times I’d punched him. I’d definitely need some icepacks and bandages once I got back to my foster home.

“Robin, you’re not hurt too bad, are you?” My brother asked, ever the worrier he is.

“He managed to get a few good hits in, but nothing bad enough that I’d need to see a doctor, so you don’t need to worry about me.” I told him, pulling my hair out of my face and back into a wolf tail with one of the hair ties I tend to keep on my wrist.

It would have been a ponytail, except for the fact that I shaved the hair off of the back and sides of my head almost a week ago, leaving my red hair only on the top of my head, reaching just below my shoulders.

“Do you want to get it iced?”

“Not right now. Can I have her back now?” I asked my brother, gesturing to my beat up black and dark green backpack.

“Here you go.” He said, carefully passing the bag over to me. Opening it up, I looked at the tiny black and white dog that, at this point, was more gray than anything.

“You’re a good girl, you know that? You stayed quiet the whole time we were in the library!” I told her, playfully moving her ears around for a bit before scratching her behind them. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a zip lock bag that I used to keep dog treats for her. I let out a sigh when I saw that there was only a few left. That wouldn’t last very long with how much the tiny dog tended to eat.

“This is one of the last few, but you deserve it.” I said, handing her the treat that looked like a tiny hotdog in a hotdog bun.

My brother Jonathan and I have lived in foster care ever since our parents died when we were little. I’m the older one out of the two of us. With the two of us constantly being passed around from one foster home to another, the two of us quickly realized that the only ones we could rely on always being there no matter what were each other.

Then there’s my dog, Ellie. She’s a mix of multiple breeds of dogs and the only one I’m able to recognize is Papillion thanks to those butterfly ears of hers that look like they’re flapping every time she jumps or I go to toss her on my bed.

My mom gave her to me as my fifth birthday present when she was already two years old. She’s thirteen now, which saddens me whenever I think about it because I had to take her to the vet a few months ago to get her shots updated and they said that they only expect her to only live at least one more year, two if we’re lucky.

“Hey, since it’s nice out and we’re not really expected back for a couple more hours, how would you feel if we were to go to that pizzeria down the street?” I asked my brother, walking backwards after jumping in front of his path so I could face him while talking. If there was a car driving on any of the roads we had to walk across, he would let me know.

“The pizza there is super greasy and expensive. Also, you didn’t have any money last time I checked.” He said, stopping at a street corner. If we walked straight according to the direction he was facing it would eventually lead us back to the foster house we were staying at. However, if we went left, according to the direction I’m facing, right according to the direction he was facing, it would quickly take us to the pizzeria.

“Hey, I actually like greasy pizza! Besides, you and I both know that there’s barely anything in the kitchen back home and I’m hungry. Also, what makes you think I don’t have any money?” I asked him, holding up the two fifty dollar bills I managed to slip out of the jerk’s pockets during the fight. When I referred to the foster home as home, I didn’t mean it. It was a fact I didn’t have to say out loud because of him being fully aware of that. After all, he felt the same way about that place. “You know what? If it makes you feel any better, I’ll ask the workers there if I can have some ice to put on my eye. Does that make you feel any better?”

“You and your sticky fingers.” Jonathan said laughing, turning towards his right.

“Crappy pizza, here we come!” I said, laughing as well.

~~~~~

“Wait, so he took the sister instead?” I heard a familiar voice say, walking into the pizzeria. I tried to ignore what he said and instead, I tore off a piece of crust from the first slice of pizza I had so I could feed it to my tiny mix breed dog that I had managed to smuggle into the pizza shop by keeping her in my backpack. I twirled my finger in the air around her muzzle before poking her on the nose when she gave me a look that I recognized as her wanting more.

“Yep. Apparently she wasn’t as attractive, but she made sure to make it up to him, if you know what I mean.” I heard a second familiar voice say. I was unable to place a face with the voices, so I found myself turning around to figure out who they were.

“Oh, dear god.” I said, pulling the hood from my jacket up while turning back around.

“Rob, what is it?” My brother said around the mouthful of his pepperoni pizza.

“You see the two boys that just walked in? The blonde is the one that kicked me out of the seat and told me to go jump off a bridge because no one likes me after I had a super crappy day at school, and the brunette is the one that started to spread rumors around the school that I’m his baby mama and sell myself super cheep.” I told him, trying to stretch my hood further over my face.

“They’re the ones that did that to you? They can’t do that to you and get away with it. I’m going to go beat them up.” Jonathan said, placing down his pizza before attempting to slide out of the booth we were sitting in.

“Don’t you dare, Little John. You don’t even come close to swinging a proper punch and I’m not about to risk both of us getting kicked out of a building in the same day.” I said, moving my leg so it blocked him from sliding out any further by placing my foot against the back of the bench he was sitting on.

Little John was originally our parents nickname for him thanks to him being named after our father. With both of them gone, I try to use it whenever I see the chance. Most of the time, that’s times like this when I need him to calm down.

“Thank you. Now just finish your pizza and root beer so we can get out of here.” I said, placing my foot back on the floor and taking a bite out of my mushroom and chicken pizza when he slid back to his seat. “Chances are that they might not even notice me anyway. Hardly anyone ever pays attention to me anyway, you know that.”

“Yeah, I know that. Doesn’t mean I think it’s right. You’re one of the most caring people I know. People should be able to realize that you exist.”

“Hey, I’m notas nice as you like to make me out to be. If I don’t like someone, I like to make sure they know it and I get into fights a lot because of that.” I told him, acting like he’d managed to insult me.

“I said that you’re caring, meaning that you tend to help people out whenever you can, even if they’re not fully on your good side. Like when you were in fifth grade and ran to get the school nurse when Lillian Merlin fell off the swings and landed on her arm even though she liked to trip you every time you walked past her.”

“Boy, she didn’t just fall off the swings and land on her arm! She flew at least ten feet away from the swing set and ended slamming her arm on the ground so hard that it ended up breaking!” I said, reaching for my large cup of sweet ice tea with the intentions of taking a huge gulp.

“Hey Tom, look who’s here!” I heard the blond boy, David say.

“Please tell me they’re not looking in our direction.” I whispered to my brother.

“Sorry. They’re walking our way right now.” He whispered back.

“Screw my luck. Don’t you dare try to step in.” I said, turning to sit so my legs were outside of the booth, getting ready to stand up.

“Hey, lesbo, who’s your girlfriend?” I heard Thomas, the brunette say, actually insulting my brother.

“Well look who it is, Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dumber.” I said, reaching behind me to make sure I was able to reach my cup of iced tea in case I felt the need to splash it on them as I stood up. “For the record you two, that’s not my girlfriend. He’s my brother.”

“What did you just call us?” Thomas, the brunette said.

“Well, I was originally going to call you two Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, after the two characters from Alice in Wonderland. You know, those two fat twins that fought each other over stuff of theirs that would go missing? You probably don’t since it doesn’t look like the two of you have willingly read a book in your life.” I said, feeling proud at the insulted looks on their faces. That’s exactly what I wanted.

“Then I decided against it, seeing how it would be an insult to two of the characters of my favorite books since they somehow still manage to seem smarter than you. Then I decided that I could call you two Dumb and Dumber instead, after the two main characters in those two movies that came out in the nineteen hundreds, but then I decided against that too since it would be an insult to those two hilarious movies. So instead, I just decided to just mix the two ideas together.” I told them, smirking when I saw Thomas clench his fingers into fists.

“Hey, don’t you two boys start! You’re lucky I let the two of you come back here at all after breaking two tables during the last fight you two had in here!” We heard the owner call out from behind the counter as Thomas reached up to punch me in my already swollen eye.

“By now!” I called after them as they walked out the pizzeria, warning me how they were planning on getting me the next chance they get. The thing that worried me was how they were staring at my bag. I really hope they didn’t notice Ellie. And if they had, I really hoped that they weren’t planning on doing anything to her.

“Dang. That was bold of you to say that to them!” Jonathan said as I sat down.

“Yeah well, when I told you two days ago that I was done taking crap from anyone, I meant it. Now hurry up and finish your food. It’s going to get dark soon and you know how he always wants us all back before the streetlights start turning on.” I said, stuffing the rest of my pizza into my mouth, making sure to save the crust for Ellie, before moving to finish off the rest of my half of the small plate of spaghetti the two of us decided to split. The ‘he’ was referring to our foster father who is a controlling jerk while the ‘us’ was referring to me, my brother, and the other foster kids the jerk was supposed to take care of.

“Crap, you’re right!” He said, stuffing his face as well after checking the time on his phone.

~~~~~

“Johnny, hurry up. The street lights are starting to turn on!” I yelled back to my brother who was a few feet behind me. “Seriously. How are you that much slower than me? I’m running with Ellie in my arms and yet you’re pretty far behind me!”

“Yeah well do you think you could slow down a bit? You know I’ve never been as fast as you!” He said back to me as I was adjusting Ellie in my jacket while running. After the first couple of months of carrying her around like I do, I noticed how it was safer if I had her tucked into my jacket while it was zipped up and held her still in it than if I were to just have her wrapped up in my arms. Less chance of her falling out of my arms that way with the way I tend to run.

“Well, excuse me for not wanting to get in trouble again! I know you’re fully aware of what happened last time I got in trouble with him!” I called back to him, stopping at the next street corner so I could wait for him to catch up with me.

I reallyreallydidn’t want to get in trouble with our foster father again. The last time I missed the sunset curfew was during the school’s spring break. He’d ended up locking me up in my room until school the break was over with no food, water, or bathroom privileges. He could easily do that too, since my bedroom door handle locks from the hallway and there’s no way to lock or unlock the handle from inside the bedroom. I couldn’t see myself surviving that week if it weren’t for the fact that my brother had been willing to get in trouble himself in order to sneak in sandwiches to me via my bedroom window. Our foster father is also the reason why I have a tendency to carry my little mutt with me everywhere I go. I don’t think I would be able to take it very well if anything were to happened to her.

“Jay look, something’s going on.” I said, noticing some red and blue flashing lights coming from what looked like our street. Noticing that we stopped, Ellie popped her head out of the opening of my jacket and started barking at the police lights. She knew that for me and my brother, police lights meant nothing but bad news, so she tended to not be a fan of them because of that. I was just glad that they didn’t have their sirens on, with how they tend to hurt Ellie’s ears.

“Hush, Ells.” I said, handing her a small piece of pizza crust from the zip lock bag full of crust pieces I had in one of my jacket pockets. Thankfully, she accepted the food and stopped barking. The little glutton will do whatever I want as long as I give her a bit of food after telling her what I want her to do. Unless it’s tricks. I never did manage to teach her any.

“Sir, you’re under arrest for neglecting to take care of minors placed under your care. Anything you say or do can and will be used against you in the court of law.” At that, me and my brother took one look at each other before taking off towards the lights, hoping that the police would be reading the rights to the person we hoped they were.

It was exactly who we thought it was. Our foster father. Looks like we would be moving to another home, again. At this point, I’d completely lost count of how many different places we’ve been moved to.

With my arms getting tired from how long I’d been carrying her, I quickly but carefully placed Ellie back into my backpack.

“Miss, my brother and I are two of the foster kids he was put in charge of. Is it okay if we go inside to grab our stuff real quick?” I asked one of the female cops.

“We have the names of the foster kids he should have been taking care of. Just tell me you and your brother’s names and if I see them, you can go in.” She said.

“Robin Marie Woodson and Jonathan Daniel Woodson.” I heard my brother say from behind me. This is the fifth time we’ve seen a situation like this with all the different foster homes we’ve been placed in.

“Jonathan, you can go in. I just need to ask your sister something real quick.” She said after finding our names.

“It says here that you have a dog, yet we didn’t see any dog when we went inside. Do you know why that is?”

“Yes I do mam. She was almost killed by the foster parents me and my brother got stuck with in our first home, so I’ve been carrying her around with me everywhere I go ever since. The day they almost killed her was also the same day they hospitalized my brother. He was seven at the time and I was the one to call the cops on them. Chances are that you might be able to find that I’ve been the one to call the cops on multiple foster homes we’ve gotten stuck in and that with almost every time, you blues have found what I’ve said to be true. The other times were the times the fosters managed to hide whatever it was I was reporting.” I told her, I was trying to be polite to her, but that didn’t stop a rude tone from entering my voice near the end.

“Now if you don’t have any more questions, I better go pack my stuff.” I said walking away.

‘I wasn’t the one to report him this time, so who did?’ I thought, walking towards what’s now no longer my room. ‘Probably doesn’t really matter.’

Once I got to the room, I closed the door and placed down my backpack and placed it down with the zipper open so Ellie could walk around the room while I was packing. After making sure she managed to get out by herself, I walked over to my closet and pulled out the duffle bag I had shoved on the top shelf and tossed onto my bed, which was really just a pillow and a torn, falling apart blanket on top of an even more beat up mattress.

Hearing the mostly empty bag slam onto the bed, Ellie jumped out of fright and turned in the direction she heard the noise come from. I laughed when her ears managed to perk up even more than they already were after spotting the duffle bag as she ran over and started rubbing her sides all over the bag before wiggling all over the bed and floor. I knew from watching how she behaves over the years that her doing that meant she hated it here and was glad that we were leaving. I was glad I wasn’t the only one who felt that way.

I heard someone walking towards the bedroom door as I finally managed to start pulling my clothes off some of the hangers.

“Need some help?” I heard my brother ask, opening the door. It was sort of a tradition we had where if one of us were to finish packing first we would always go and help the other finish packing after.

“Are you kidding me? I just started getting my clothes out. Of course I need help!” I said as he walked in, closing the door behind him.

“You were getting distracted by Ellie again, weren’t you?” He asked, taking some of the clothes out of my arms.

“Maaaybe.” I said, slightly embarrassed. He just laughed as he started to help me put my clothes away. Like it when I’m able to get him laughing by even the smallest, dumbest things I do. It helps me remember that no matter how crappy our situation might become in the next house, or how bad it might have seemed in the previous places, that it’s always possible for us to find ways to be happy.

~~~~~

“This is the last house I could find in the area that was willing to take in both you two and the dog. You two mess this up and I’ll either end up having to separate you two from each other or finding that little Ellie of yours a new home.” Our social worker, Jasmine Agreste said. She’d been working with us since the beginning.

“We understand, Mrs. A.” I said. I knew for a fact that she was married and had a daughter a few years younger than me from the time me and Jonathan ended up staying in her house for a few months thanks to there being no homes at all available at the time. I was actually on sort of friendly terms with her daughter, who on one occasion admitted that she sees me like an older sister.

I don’t know how I feel about her or her mom though. It’s been hard for me to trust people other than my brother. I guess I could consider us friends.

“So, what could you tell us about the person we’re staying with this time?” Jonathan asked.

“She had biological kids of her own, a son and daughter, who both ended up moving out a few months ago. She had apparently grown up in foster care herself. She just recently got approved, so the two of you are going to be the first kids she takes in.”

“Well this should be interesting.” Me and Jonathan said at the same time.

~~~~~

The house the lady lived in looked to me almost like a more welcoming version of the house the Addams Family owned in the black and white TV show. It was only a couple of miles away from the place we were now leaving, so we would still be able to go to the same schools once they opened back up once summer break was over.

“Evelyn Blanchard? These are Robin and Jonathan Woodson, the two siblings you agreed to take in.” I heard Jasmine say to some lady with graying brown hair that answered the door.

“Well in that case, welcome you two. Now, come on in you three!” I heard Evelyn, the lady that was apparently mine and Jonathan’s new foster parent say. We may be sixteen and fourteen, but that didn’t stop Jonathan from grabbing ahold of my hand with how nervous he was. Normally from what we’ve seen, if someone acts super cheery like she currently is when we first arrive then chances are that they’re hiding their real self.

“I give it a week.” I whispered into his ear, stating how long I thought it would be until she quit her act.

“I say two.”

“Now, Robin. I heard you have a dog?” Evelyn asked, heading for the direction I guessed might have been the kitchen.

“That’s correct.” I said, refusing to move from near the front door. It looked as if the whole place had been cleaned recently. I was well aware of how the bottom of my boots were covered in mud and possibly even some animal crap. I didn’t want to risk angering her if I accidentally got it all over her carpet and I didn’t feel comfortable enough to take my shoes off either. Looking over at Jonathan out of the corner of my eye, I could tell that he had the same idea with how he kept looking around nervously. It may have looked similar to the Addams Family’s house on the outside, but it looked almost nothing like it on the inside.

“Where is it?” She asked, sounding actually curious.

“She’s in my backpack. I rarely ever let her leave my side.” I said, hoping that she would be able to hear just how protective I am over Ellie.

“You can let her out of there if you’d like.” She said, coming out of the kitchen with a plate full of sandwiches that she’d placed on the coffee table before sitting on one of the two couches. I knew that Ellie wouldn’t go anywhere if it meant me being out of her site and there’s no way her paws should be dirty enough to track around any dirt, so I carefully placed my bag down onto the floor and lifted her out. To the surprise of both me and my brother, Ellie walked right over to Evelyn and didn’t growl or try to bite her ankles.

“Aww. She’s so sweet!” Evelyn said as Ellie kissed her hands a couple times before laying under the coffee table and going to sleep. Jonathan, noticing this, let go of my hand.

‘If Ellie trusted her then I guess I could learn to trust her too.’ I thought.

“Is it okay if I go grab our stuff out of the car?” I asked.

“Well, since you’r going to be staying here, I don’t see why not. Would you like any help?” Evelyn said.

“There’s not that much, my brother’s all the help I need.” I said, heading out the door. I could tell that Ellie woke up from her attempt at taking a nap as soon as I left the house because I could hear her barking even after Jonathan closed the door.

“I’m guessing you trust her?” He asked after we reached the car.

“What makes you think that?” I asked, opening up the trunk after hearing Jasmine pop it open for us.

“You were willing to let Ellie stay sleeping in there with her. That’s the first time you’ve done that.”

“I don’t trust her. Not yet anyways, but Ellie seems to like her and that’s enough for me.” I said, passing him his duffle bag before grabbing my bag and the small foam steps Ellie needed during the times my bed was more than just a mattress on the floor, and closing the trunk. Luckily, or unluckily depending on how you looked at it, the only shoes we had were the ones on our feet. I liked to look at the bright side and remind myself that it just meant that much less things we would have to worry about.

“You ready to go back in?” I asked him.

“Not really. Could you let them know I’ll be sitting out here for a bit?” He asked, handing his bag back over to me.

“Sure thing.” I said, grabbing it from him. As I’d expected, Evelyn asked where my brother was as soon as she saw me walk through the door as Ellie started running her slow circles at my feet, barking at me to let me know how mad she was at leaving without her.

“He said he’s going to stay out there for a bit.” I said, placing our bags and Ellie’s steps down on the couch she wasn’t sitting on before taking my shoes off. It still didn’t feel right taking them off here, but it was better than tracking dirt everywhere. “Is it alright if I use the bathroom?”

“Sure thing. Go up the stairs, take a left, then it’s the first door on the right.”

Seeing how Ellie was following me as I headed towards the steps, I picked her up and carried her the whole trip up before placing her on the floor for the second level. I then had to wait for her to walk into the bathroom before I closed the door. If I didn’t then she would sit outside it and howl the whole time.

As I closed the door, I heard Evelyn ask worriedly if Jonathan might have ran off only for Jasmin to explain how he wouldn’t run off without me and I wouldn’t run off without him or my dog.

~~~~~

“The two of you have gone through a lot in your previous homes, haven’t you?” Evelyn asked us not long after Jasmin left. Jonathan had sat next to me on the couch as soon as he’d come in, only taking enough time to take off his shoes and place them next to mine that is.

“Now what would make you think that?” I asked, not bothering to hide the harsh tone in my voice.

“How the two of you tend to drift towards each other like attracting magnets. Not to mention the scars I see on your feet, Robin.” She said, gesturing to my bare feet. Not like I had any socks to cover them. They’d all gotten warn out beyond use a few weeks ago and I hadn’t been able to find the time to make it to the store since then.

“The scars on my feet have nothing to do with anything we may or may not have been put through. Those scars are there because on more than one occasion, I dropped plates and bowls on them thanks to sneezing not long after picking them up.” I said embarrassed because of how it actually was true. She didn’t need to know that I had some scars on my back from the punishments I’d gotten for some of the times that had happened.

“Well, in that case, I think it’s time the two of you see your rooms.”

The room she led me to must have either been her daughter’s or she had repainted it when she heard I was coming, Best way I could quickly describe it was a fantasy princess’s bedroom.

The walls were pale pink with lavender trimming, the carpet dark purple. The bed was a canopy bed with a green curtain and the blankets themselves were a pale blue with ruffles all over the edges.

“I can tell by the look on your face that you don’t like it. We could go to the store tomorrow so you can pick out stuff to redecorate it if you’d like.” She said. It was true. The only thing I could see myself getting use to was the canopy’s curtains because of them being green and because of how they looked like they might be blackout curtains. The carpet wasn’t that bad either, even though I’m not a huge fan of purple.

“The most the two of us have ever been in one place was a month. If we make it past that time, then I might take up your offer.” I said, knowing how I could easily replace the pillowcases with my own and how I could probably go to the store and get some new blankets with the money I’d taken from our previous foster father. Not like he would need it anyway, seeing as how he’s in jail.

“Jonathan, here’s your room.” She said, showing him a room not too far from mine. Well, there was a room in between ours, but I was just glad that it wasn’t on the other side of the house.

After placing down the doggy-steps and making sure Ellie would be able to get up onto the bed with the help, I walked over to the window of the bedroom I would be staying in for who knows how long and looked out. There wasn’t any bit of a roof that me or my brother could walk on to get to each other’s rooms if we’d ever gotten ourselves locked in them. I knew that the two of us would figure something out if that ever happened, so I decided to walk down the hall to see what his room looked like.

His room, to me, definitely looked more like the things he liked than my room with me. The wall was blue with white trimming, a gray carpet, and the bedding was red.

I sat on the bed and waited until Evelyn left before I laid on my back asked him how long he thinks we’d be staying here.

“You should know by know that I don’t like to think about that. “Could you tell me more?” He asked in a way that was somehow both sad and hopeful.

I knew what he wanted me to tell more of. He would always ask to hear about our parents with that tone. In fact, he’d only ever sounded like that when asking me to tell him more about them. I didn’t have that many more memories about our parents than he did, but he didn’t seem to mind. There were even times when the two of us would remember something about one of our parents that the other didn’t.

I decided to tell him how one time our dad decided it was a good idea for just me and him to go on a weekend road trip together, only for us to get a flat tire during the middle of a rain storm he hadn’t known about. It wasn’t funny at the time, but now it is to me, with all the different faces our dad would make each time someone would drive past us. He ended up falling asleep not long before I got to the end of what I could remember from that day, so I managed to carefully climb out of his bed before going back to what was my new room.

It had been a long day for both of us and it was starting to get late anyway.

~~~~~

Prologue | Chapter 2 (in progress)

#Robin Woodson #Jonathan Woodson #Ellie the dog #mentioned abuse #mentioned previous abuse #swearing

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