#feel bad. so im going to say that due to mental strain that im going thru right now myself and the school have decided to place me in a | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

simpsiren · 3 years

Text

the hopeless romantic;

mark lee x reader

Mark Lee is your guy. He’s the sweetest man alive, extremely kind to everyone he gets into contact with. With his signature laugh, what’s there to not like? He’s bubbly, bright, a ball of sunshine. He’s probably happiness itself. However, perhaps his joy had some cons to them. Like being the one that had always tried to see the bright side of every mishap when he knew it too well that there’s just nothing good to be seen in some things. Or the fact that he wants to simply be seen as the one happy person with zero worries for the world whatsoever.

genre. angst, emotional, broken lovers, fluff

word count. 12.8k~ (shorter than expected vjdhsis)

a/n. im so sorry if the story is fast paced or it isn’t long enough i was running out of time and i was busy with school for the whole week i barely had free time. i really wanted to meet the release date so i highly doubt this is up to standards :(

description. eshajōri— the idea about the impermanence of all things, that every human relationship will end some day due to the transient nature of life

That’s what I thought. That the world had to continue spinning. That’s just how life is. I slowly fell out of love in my relationship with Mark. He’s everything I ever wanted, but it just seemed to end up that way. I was wrong to think he’s just another phase in my life, one that comes and goes, never to meet me again. When in reality, he became something much, much more. Memories tainted, love was lost. Yet, Mark took me down a journey that helped me remind myself why I fell in love in the first place and find feelings that I thought were long gone.

!as they should masterlist!

It was late into the night. The stars above shined brightly over the blank dark canvas. I couldn’t keep my head down from it, simply straining my neck by looking upwards to the sky as I thought over about what to say to Mark. A lot of things went through my mind while I made my way to his band room. The good, the bad. I sent myself on an emotional roller coaster ride. I’ve waited long enough, I kept telling myself. I’ve been holding out for far too long. I’ve been building it all up for this day.

I went into the building, now dimly lit with an orange hue from the one lamp at the front desk. I made my way to the fifth floor, absentmindedly taking the stairs so that I could drag out time for just a little while longer. I took wary steps, perhaps my legs started wobbling as I inched closer to the room down the hallway. I stood in front of the door, knowing Mark was on the other side. Though I was sure of doing this, I began to wonder if it was the right thing. If I should simply brush it off. Did I care about my feelings more... or Mark’s?

“I need to do what I have to do.” I muttered under my breath as I grabbed the door handle, cold to the touch and pushing it down to open the door. It creaked loudly, just like how it always had every time I came here. I looked around, spotting Mark in the corner with his guitar. I guess he chose to play the acoustic one today, his head tilted down to the point where only the top part of his fluffy hair was visible. His fingers carefully placed on the strings as he strummed a few chords and hummed with happily.

Mark looked up at me upon my arrival, though I’ve been standing at the doorframe for quite some time, and it was only now did he notice my presence. “Baby!” He shriek, placing the guitar he had on his lap on the stand and making a beeline over to me. Mark pulled me into a hug, to which I responded with a hug back. Feel something, please. Why aren’t you feeling anything with Mark’s arms around you?

Mark pulled away, a happy giggle leaving his lips. He held my hand, intertwining his fingers with mine as he walked me over to where he sat at. He motioned me to sit on the stool next to him with a jark of his chin. Our hands were still held together, my eyes trailing from them and to Mark’s face.

I looked at his hair, the one I never failed to touch the moment I see him, but not today. His eyes that meant so much to me, ones that never failed to look into mine with nothing but joy. His lips that formed the most perfect smile that lit up my world, never failing to let out his beautiful voice, when he sang or when he talked, or when he expressed his love for songwriting each time he talked to me about the many songs he wrote. To top it off, his signature laugh, one that came out from him and him only. No one did it like Mark.

“Why did you call to meet me here? Did you want to accompany me while I practiced?” I realised that Mark was talking and I came zinging back to attention. I pursed my lips into a thin line, a small smile forming after. “Where’s the rest of the Dreamies?” I questioned back, again wanting to put off the time I had to say what I wanted to. Mark galnced to the door before looking back at me. “They already left. I would have gone home but you texted me so.” Mark bobbed his shoulders as a way to finish his sentence.

I hummed softly in response. I exhaled, a little too loudly to the point where Mark raised a questioning brow at me and asked again, “So what are you here for?” I closed my eyes, mentally preparing myself as I bat them open to lock eyes with Mark. “I need to talk to you about something.” I could already feel my voice wanting to crack and break, my eyes already preparing its tears for when it’s time to let them out. Regardless, I kept my calm composure for Mark to see.

“We’ve known each other for seven years, got together for five.” I bit the inside of my cheek, forcing myself to resume though I wanted to simply stop there and scrap this whole thing off like it was nothing. “Aren’t you... Tired of it? Tired of me?” I wanted to continue without hearing Mark’s reply. I couldn’t bear to hear his voice. Yet, he lets out, “What? Of course not. I’m never tired of you.”

I shut my eyes hard, shaking my head as I looked down. “No, you don’t get it Mark Lee. See, that’s the thing. You’re never tired of me. You’re never tired of our relationship. Not once did you have any doubts about us.” I breathed a painful chuckle, having to run a hand down my face and taking a deep breath. I met his eyes again for a brief moment. I could tell they were scared. It was filled with fear and anxiety, already anticipating on what I wanted to say.

“I’m not feeling the love between us anymore, Mark Lee.” I finally let out. Mark’s bright smile faltered to small frown at first, and eventually grew into nothing. He had an emotionless expression on, one that I tried to mentally pull apart piece by piece to find his true emotion, but to no avail. Of course I had my guesses though. “And it’s not because of anything bad. It’s just...” I kept a pause, wanting to see how I could phrase it in the most gentlest way possible, but I realised there was no other way to say it than, “You’re just too kind, Mark. You’ve always been kind. We’ve never even fought once in our five year relationship. I guess... I got bored of it.”

Mark wasn’t saying a single thing, simply staring at me as if wanting to tell me, “Let it all out before it’s my turn to fire back.” And so be it. I continued. “Echajōri.” I said out of the blue. “I looked it up. It’s when no human relationship would last due to the simple nature of life. That’s what I think this is. It’s just how it works. That’s just how the world wants us to be. Who knows, you’re probably just a phase in my life.”

“I love you, Mark. You’re perfect in all ways. Me falling out of love was probably nature’s doing. If the world continues to spin, and the world’s forces want us to meet again, then we shall. We’ll know it’s fate. But for now...” I released Mark’s hand from mine, only noticing now how tightly he was holding on while I got lost trying to spill it all out. Mark let his hand loose so that I could slide it away.

I pushed myself off the stool, adjusting my purse. I walked back to the door, eyes closed with shallow breaths. Hesitantly, I placed my hand on the door handle. I turned around one last time, my mouth opening and closing as I tried to form my sentence. “D-Do you... have nothing to say?” I asked, voice clearly breaking as I was at the point of collapsing. Mark avoided my gaze, blinking his eyes rapidly as if wanting to hold back his tears. He sniffled, turning his head elsewhere before going back to me, his eyes too scared to meet mine.

“If that’s how you want it. Then so be it.” I widened my eyes ever so slightly, the cold and harsh tone of his words firing back at me. His face was kept soft and tender but his words rolled hard on his tongue, sharply slicing the sliver of confidence I had left in me. “Goodbye, Mark Lee.” I croaked out, not even botjering to sound fine as I left and exited the room.

Like a snap of the fingers, I fell hard onto the floor, preventing myself from making a loud thud as I did so. I covered my mouth, scrunching myself up into a ball as I cried hard, head dipped down and too scared to face the world. I wanted to scream, knock my head against the wall and say, “You’re the meanest person alive. Fuck you for hurting Mark.” That was all I could think about. I didn’t want to stay here long. I couldn’t bear to be in any close of a proximity to Mark after what I just did.

I made my way out of the building. There’s no coming back for me. Thus is a terrifying feeling. It’s the feeling of something turning, of coming to a corner and going around it and seeing that the street ahead is dark and deserted filled with wild dogs but you cant go back only forward into the middle of the pack. I had to wipe my face constantly to get rid of the dried up tears on my cheeks and the snot that blocked my nose, yet it never seemed to stop. Not while I walked back home, and when I was at home. I cried into the night till I fell asleep in despair, my muffled cries being the last thing I hear for the rough night.

“Mark, open the damn door!” The banging on Mark’s door had been going on since the breaking dawn of the morning. The sun was disgustingly shining over Mark’s face as the sun began to rise and make its way up into the sky. Mark covered his eyes with his forearm in an attempt to block the sunlight. His world was falling apart as each second passed by. He had no energy for anything. Though the world was still spinning, he wasn’t. He wanted it all to pause. Everything going by too fast and he simply wanted to slow down.

However, he slowly grew annoyed at the fact that his friends had been sitting outside his apartment for hours now. He forced himself out of bed with an annoyed groan, ruffling his greasy hair and taking dragged steps to the door, finally opening it.

Haechan was standing right in front of him, almost falling from the sudden open of the door. Behind him was the rest of Mark’s only friends, his band members. Haechan huffed, folding his arms and placing his weight on one leg. “Let us through.” Haechan abruptly pushed Mark away, bursting in Mark’s place unannounced like how they sometimes did. The rest came in, eyes glancing to Mark for a moment. He made eye contact with each of them, and he knew they all had that look of concern that Mark had no desire to see.

Either way, he let them in, closing the door behind him and wanting to make his way straight to the couch to lay back down, only to realise all his friends had occupied it fully. “We need to have a serious talk.” Mark wished they didn’t bring it up. Mark wished that he didn’t have to go through this, the inevitable situation of being interrogated. “Serious? Wonder what.” Mark echoed dryly, making his way to the kitchen.

“You know what we mean! You haven’t been to practices for so long.” Mark heard Renjun’s voice whining as he opened the fridge, taking the slice of watermelon on instinct. He shut the fridge, taking long lazy strides back to the living room. “And?” Plopping himself down next to the group, the sound of Chenle cursing under his breath being unintentionally loud. “And? That’s it?! Mark you-” Chenle sounded as if he was out to choke Mark dead, but he was trying to think of what to say. Mark took a bite of his watermelon.

“You kept making excuses and purposely skipping.” Chenle added on through gritted teeth. Mark had his head hung low the whole time, taking small yet quick bits like a rabbit. Jaemin, being the one closest to him, cleared his throat. “It’s obvious, you know? We’ve been your friends long enough to know that something’s wrong.” Jaemin’s comforting tone rang through Mark’s ears. He was getting an earful, but thankfully Jaemin was there to soothe it down

“Mark, please. Say something. We’re worried.” Finally, Mark lifted his head up at his best friend’s voice, Jeno. “I don’t wanna talk about it.” Mark whispered, but loud enough for them to hear. He reached his hand out to grab a tissue and wrap it around the finish watermelon, placing it on the table. He dragged his knees close to his chest and hugged himself into a ball like he always had since that day. “We would have accepted that excuse back then but you know it’s not working this time.” Jisung, the youngest spoke up.

“How long has it been? Since I became like this?” Mark asked, he genuinely wanted to know since he had lost track of time. “Four whole months.” Mark chuckled weakly with the few of them answering in unison. Mark ran a hand through his hair, the greasiness from not washing it didn’t actually bothered Mark till now.

“Four months had passed. Do you guys think four months is enough to get me back on my feet after I’ve broken up from a five year relationship?”

Mark’s question made everyone sat there, frozen and still. Their faces turning blank and speechless. Haechan tried to open his mouth, but it only ended up quivering at the thought that he didn’t know what to mention at all. Mark glazed his eyes over his friends. He knew they couldn’t help him. He dugged himself this hole of despair, and he wasn’t able to get out. Those four months, Mark had tried to find ways to get back to her, he questioned himself on what he did wrong, what he could do to piece it all back together. But of course, with the sadness sliding in, Mark had no hope left in his body.

“Do you want to tell us what happened?” Chenle’s voice became soft and gentle, not like before when he was rigid and pissed at his friend for not coming to the many practices he purposely skipped. Mark took in a deep breath. He’s been practicing. Not breaking down the moment it was time to talk about it. He promised himself he won’t break down, making himself look like a mess.

“She said she fell out of love. She said it wasn’t a bad thing, though I don’t see how it’s good either. She basically said that our relationship had been too happy, too perfect, I guess?” Mark had to take a second. Oh no, the tears were welling up in his eyes. On instinct, Jeno went down from the couch to hug Mark tight. And at his touch, Mark let his body loose, crying hard into his friend’s hoodie.

“She began to get bored of me, Jeno!” Mark croaked out, as if the rest were not looking at the two on the floor with worrisome and hesitation, not sure if they should comfort Mark as well, or simply sit there. Sometimes it was best to not interfere. This is one of those instances.

“She literally said that it’s just the way of life. That it was natural for her to lose feelings for me. That that’s just how the world works. But I don’t get it! I’ve been trying to find the good out of this, but I can’t. I fucking can’t!” Mark shook his head vigorously, hands clutching tight on Jeno’s hoodie while he dug his head into Jeno’s chest more and practically poured his heart out.

“Um... Can I say something?” Everyone paused in there movements, including Mark as their heads slowly turned to Jisung who had his body leaned back into the couch, a shaky and uncertain hand raised. The rest raised a brow in a shocking manner, but also curious as to what the youngest had to say on this. “What?” Mark asked, barely audible and recognisable.

“Alright well, see. Maybe I could understand from her point of view.” Jisung looked at the others for confirmation to keep going, only to be met with disgusted faces that said, “How could you?!” “Can’t you see Mark’s crying here?!” As if Jisung could clearly hear it, he placed both hands up in defence mode. “Listen! In a five year relationship, don’t you guys agree that it’ll get boring? You’re being together with someone for so long, how can anyone not get tired of it?”

“I didn’t.” “Well most people do, Mark.”

Jisung lowered his voice as he spoke. “And if you want the relationship to last long, it needs to be exciting, it needs to feel fresh and new no matter how long it’s been. Don’t you guys get it? Perhaps, from what I know, Mark has always been bright and perfect. Imagine not having a fight or some sort of argument for five years. It’s not always good for a relationship to suffer from no problems that would affect the relationship. All relationship has to have its flaws, or else it’ll feel unreal. Perhaps she felt that it was unrealistic.”

The silence that had already filled the room from the beginning was now falling deeper upon the youngest’s wise words. It was practically pin drop silence now, with only Mark’s shallow breathing and sniffles to be heard. He wiped his face with the sleeve of his shirt. Exhaling loudly, he said, “Then what can I do? If she’s lost feelings for me, I don’t see another way...” Mark realised how deep he was into this. How Jisung made him realise that it was true. He’s been nothing but happy towards her that they’ve never had a single argument or anything. He understood what she meant by her words that resonated in his mind while Jisung talked.

Renjun slammed his hands on the table, palm faced down while looking to Mark. “Then show her how you two were at the beginning of the relationship!” Renjun exclaimed, as if he had the most brilliant idea. The room was suddenly lit. The atmosphere changed as everyone nodded their heads in agreement. Everyone turned to Mark, who leaned back from the sudden lift of atmosphere.

“Exactly! Show her why she fell in love with you in the first place!” Jaemin shouted as well. Mark was suddenly bombarded with everyone screaming and giving chants of encouragement. Meanwhile, Jeno was looking at him with the softest smile, both him and Mark shaking their heads at everyone’s outrageous behaviour.

“We’ll help you.” Jeno whispered, a firm and assuring hand on Mark’s shoulder. Mark had never asked them for help, ever. No matter what he suffered, he suffered it alone, wanting to be seem as the person who could handle whatever’s been thrown at him himself. But with a problem like this that made him fall so deep into the loophole, he knew from the get-go that he could trust his friends. No second thought needed.

I worked at a bookstore. As cliché as that sounded, I liked working there. You get free books whenever there’s unwanted stock, you didn’t have to work much, simply arranging the books and being the cashier. I only had one other person who worked with me here, which was Jaehyun.

In a small bookstore with books handpicked by the owner herself, it wouldn’t be the most popular bookstore around. Hence, why it’s always a breeze to work here, not having to deal with a whole bunch of customers. “Should we get lunch?” Jaehyun asked after coming out from the back, patting his apron which I never knew why he wore in the first place. I smiled softly. “There’s no one to watch the store but us.” I reminded him, placing the last book I had in my arms on the shelf and making sure it fits snug in between the rest of the books.

Jaehyun hummed, nodding his head thoughtfully. “Looks like we’re ordering take out from the restaurant right down the street.” Jaehyun taunted, leaning his face forward jokingly while taking out his phone. “I’d be too lazy to go anyways. I’m tired.”

Jaehyun chuckled. “Mentally or physically?” I didn’t even take me a second to plainly reply with, “Both.” I walked up to the counter where Jaehyun sat at, his head tilted down to his phone. I sat on the opposite side, letting my arms fall and hit the wood. “Why are you tired?” Jaehyun suddenly asked. I blinked my eyes, trying to formulate answer which ended up being, “What do you mean?” Which was not even a proper answer in the first place.

“Why are you mentally tired?” Jaehyun’s voice grew low and soft while it became serious. I knew right then and there what he was implying. He had always been hinting on me about it. I knew he noticed my change in behaviour, and wanted to know why. As much as I wanted to tell him, my answer to that had always been the same. “Just... things.” I lied through my teeth, the answer being too vague and suspicious. It only got Jaehyun to shake his head.

“I know something happened, come on. You can never hide your feelings.” Jaehyun said firmly. We both knew it was a fact. Something I’ve struggled with all my life, which meant that as much as I wanted to keep it to myself, I had to let it out sooner or later with the invisible pressure I have always gotten from my surroundings. “Do... Do you remember the night when I went to your house and got drunk?” Jaehyun looked up with thought before replying with a hum.

I bit my lower lip, silence circulating the air for a brief moment. “You literally came unannounced and you never told me why either since you were already drunk when you came.” Jaehyun recalled softly, he turned his phone to me, motioning to pick something to eat. While I scrolled through the options, I exhaled sharply. “Well um... a few days before that, I did something. Terrible.” My chest puffed up and down, I couldn’t tell what Jaehyun’s expression was, but I knew from the silencd again that he knew I was beating around the bush.

Jaehyun suddenly snatched his phone away from me. I gaped my mouth open. “Hey I wasn’t done-” “Tell me what’s wrong.” Jaehyun demanded, eyes piercing into mine. I frowned, slowly pointing down to the phone. “If you can just help me press the burger-”

“_____, please!” Jaehyun half-shouted. I instantly grew quiet, intimidated by his sudden shout. He took in a deep breath before continuing. “Four months. You aren’t like how you were before. I know I’ve never questioned you straight up. And I can feel how much you’re trying to hide it. Are you dumb to think you can do that with me?” Jaehyun leaned back from his hunched over position to fold his arms.

“What am I suppose to say? The fact that I broke up with my boyfriend of five years? That I hurt his feelings for the sake of mine? That even though he’s been nothing but good to me I made the damn decision to break his heart for my own good?!” I retorted back, voice escalating with each sentence. I pinched my temples, hot air suddenly rising to my head. That sudden burst that came out of me also resurfaced emotions that I wanted to keep underground, away from my heart and mind. But it was all now out in the open, and I couldn’t simply ignore it any longer.

“There, I said it. And I don’t think I can ever get rid of the guilt from that night four months ago.” My voice lowered itself till I became inaudible. I closed my eyes for a moment to allow myself to calm down. I wanted to cry it all out again, just like I did that night. But i’ve shed far too many tears till I simply couldn’t cry anymore, only having to deal with the weight of my heart that sunk due to these feelings, feelings that blocked my lungs from letting me breathe fresh air.

“Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?” Jaehyun whispered, his angry expression growing into a look of sympathy. “That’s the face I don’t want to see. The damn look of pity of the people I tell this to. That’s why I didn’t want to say anything in the first place.” I let out, swallowing whatever feelings I had and making sure its kept deep in my heart again.

Jaehyun kept silent, and the air around us suddenly grew thick, suffocating me as unsaid words floated around. I cleared my throat to break the thin ice of silence. “I told myself that he’s just another phase in my life. No matter how long we’ve been together. He meant a lot to me... but whatever that happened has happened. I can’t change the past, so I’ll move on from it, one way or another.” I said, directing it to myself and not exactly to Jaehyun.

“You didn’t have to do it alone.” Jaehyun whispered, his eyes lifted up from the counter and to me. He locked his gaze to me, our eye contact never breaking. I felt the sincerity, care through his look. “I know you aren’t over it. So if you need anyone, just come to me. I’ll be anything you need me to be. I’m always here.”

I got home one night from a day out with Jaehyun. I was tired to the core, eyes barely half opened as I kicked my shoes off and went straight for my room, dropping my sling back at the door and plopping myself down on my bed, letting my body sink into sheets. I got comfortable, hugging my soft toys. Just when I wanted to close my eyes and drift off, my phone rang.

I flinched at the ringing, the vibrating on my hand only making me groan. I picked it up. The lockscreen glaring the only name I never wanted to see. “Did I not delete his number?” I muttered to myself in a weak voice, trying to recall if I ever did. But I soon remembered that the time I “got rid off all traces of Mark” was when I got drunk. I got to know that I never did anything regarding that.

I stared at the screen, the ringing still ongoing and Mark’s name glaring at me widely and boldly. I would have done everything I could to get it out of my sight. But something in me made me press the pick-up botton at the bottom with a shaky thumb filled with fear and uncertainty. I slowly brought my phone up to my ear, not letting out a word.

There was silence for a moment, which turned into a long moment. I suddenly heard shuffling, like someone’s moving in there seat. The phone’s been moved. A sudden shallow breathing that was most probably Mark’s. “You picked up... I’m surprised.” The moment I heard Mark’s voice, my heart shattered into millions of pieces. His voice, still sweet as ever, sounded as if he was talking to the most fragile being on earth.

“Why-” “You don’t have to say anything. I’m actually not feeling good right now.”

A little more inspection on the tone of his voice got me to realise that he was drunk. Did he call me while drinking? I could hear him coughing away from the speaker on the other end. I got worried, wanting to make sure he was fine. “Did you drink?” I asked bluntly. Mark chuckled softly, the sound sending shivers down my spine. It felt unreal, suddenly having him talk to me after all these months. But perhaps it was, the probability of him forgetting he ever contacted me was there.

“I have a song... I wrote. It’s not about you. I mean... it might be. Is it?” Mark giggled carelessly. “Do you want to hear it?” I could tell Mark’s throat was dry, coarse, like he’s been drinking for hours. I knew him well enough to recognise the slightest changes. Before I could ever answer, the shuffling came back again, and after awhile, a strum of a guitar was heard. “When the sun and moon pass over my head. I try to move on, try to move on.” My lips quievered tremendously, wanting my lips to part and voice out, “Please don’t sing. You’re hurting me.” But I couldn’t. No sound left my lips. I was rendered speechless.

“Even though the world we created is already messed up. I am still stuck here, broken.” Mark voice rang through my ears. I placed my hand to my head, scrunching up my hair as I balled my hand into a fist, anger and frustration, but also sadness and despair began rising up. All feelings I tried so hard within these months to get rid of, coming back at me, full blow, at two fold. “Mark...” He continued singing regardless.

“How do I miss you baby? How can I still be missing you like this? I know I should move on. I know I should go on. How do I love again? Just come back to me.” I broke down harder with each word, my other hand dropping the phone to cover my mouth as tight as possible while I cried and screamed, everything muffled and hidden. Everything was crashing over my heart. It grew heavy to the point where I couldn’t carry myself properly no longer.

I couldn’t be facing another day like this. I’ve tried so hard to get over Mark, try to forget the guilt of leaving the most sweetest person in my life. I regretted it every single day, I still do. But I continued, carried on, moved on with life. But having him show up suddenly, his voice, oh so sweet, a song he’s singing for me.

Days went on. I could never get the song out of my head. Mark’s voice made me envision him, at his house, guitar on his lap. He sang with his whole heart, true to him and his feelings. I couldn’t bear it. It kept resonating in my head. I even began humming it and eventually singing it, but broke down each time. The action was so instantaneous, something I did without any second thought. I kept unknowingly driving myself into having a breakdown each time I did that.

“You’re making it so hard for me to move on, Mark Lee. Why did you have to be this kind of person? Why can’t you just hate me? I’m fucking regretting it every single second of my life. Why can’t you just help me relief the pain by hating me? Forgetting me whole? Why can’t you do that?” I cried out. All I wanted was to grab a glass of water, now sitting on the cold kitchen floor with the empty glass on the counter. The melody crept into my mind again, a monster eating me up. My heart ached as I began singing again, voice cracking and words indescribable and barely audible for anyone to hear.

The very next day, I was met with darkness. Not quite since a small slice of light in between the curtains shined through, but at least it wasn’t blaring and blinding right at my eyes. I called Jaehyun, agreeing that he’d pick me up to get breakfast before we got into work. I was simply getting ready, half an hour passing by when the doorbell rang. I raised a brow in question. “What’s Jaehyun doing here?” I asked to myself, looking down to my phone to see the text messages he sent. He shouldn’t be here for another ten minutes.

I quickly tied my hair in a messy low bun and ran for the door, opening it instantly since I thought jt was the mailman. It wasn’t. Who stood in front of me would’ve made me drop to my feet, but I couldn’t. Instead, my feet were rooted to the ground. It was Mark.

He stared at me, and I stared back. He was piercing his soft gaze at me as if turning me to stone. I felt weird. One look and it felt like time hasn’t passed by at all. It was as if he’s looking right into my heart and soul through my eyes. I took this moment to eye him slowly. He had a change of hair colour, subtle but noticeable, from black to a silverish-purple type of colour. I noticed how he wore his gold round glasses, ones that I knew he’d wear every morning. His style? Hasn’t changed either. Nothing about him has changed.

“Mark?” I questioned, though I knew it was him right in front of me. My phone suddenly rang, making me jump in my spot out of shock. I huffed, looking down and realising it was Jaehyun. I froze for a moment, my eyes trailing from the screen and to Mark, who had both his hands in the pocket of his black blue jeans, standing upright. He jerked his head down to the phone. “Answer it.” Mark simply said. I gulped nervously and frantically picked up the call.

“Jaehyun um. You’re here already?” My eyes couldn’t stop flickering from the surroundings and to Mark, going back and forth, making fidgeting movements as I talked to Jaehyun. “Um actually you don’t have to pick me up. Tell Misses Lee that I’m not coming today. Something... happened.” I glanced to Mark. He still had that expressionless look on his face. Again, out of anxiety, I let out answers that sounded too vague. Of course Jaehyun had to ask, “What? Are you okay? Do you need me to go up?” To which I responded with, “No! No,no um... Something came up. Just get going.”

I instantly ended the call, dropping my hand loose and letting the grip my fingers around my phone go loose. “Explain yourself, please.” I whispered, shaking my head. “W-What are you doing here?” My voice got shaky quick the more he’s eyes darted at me, as if I was the only thing in the focus of his vision. Mark inhaled, chest puffing up. “Do you have time to go out?”

My brows knitted together, not sure of where this was going. I came up with whatever possible reason for him to ask such a question so suddenly. I bit my lower lip, smacking my lips after and shaking my head again. “Why?” Mark thinned his lips, glancing sideways and rocking his body back and forth, switching from his toes to heels, like a little kid. “Am I allowed to take you somewhere?”

I wrapped my arms around my body, my head tilting back down to my feet. I thought long and hard, should I go or should I not? What would happen if I do? What if I don’t? Would I abandon all the hardwork I’ve tried to get over him, only to have it crumble down with his presence and the day I’ll be spending with him if I agreed? Or will I regret again and have it add on to my already huge mountain pile of guilt?

Such questions wrapped around my mind, getting itself comfortable as if telling me, “Looks like we’ll be here for awhile.” I shook my head vigorously as if clearing slate. “You good?” Mark questioned in a gentle voice. I snapped my head up so hard I probably gave myself whiplash. Mind still foggy from the many thoughts, I simply replied. “Let’s go.” without a second to think it over.

“No going back.” The same thing I told myself when I came into the band room to finish it off with Mark. Now, I watched as Mark flashed his smile. Though it was the same smile that always made me flash a smile back, this time it sent another unknown feeling, a bad one. I was now craving for the feeling I’d get when I saw his smile. I didn’t like that something else was settling on my heart while I looked at his lips curving upwards, lips becoming thin.

Mark swirled around and walked, his leaned posture and relaxed shoulders almost made him look like he sauntered down the hallway. I watched his back, he still had much style with his graphic tee. He looked as flawless no matter what angle. His head turned, for a brief second he glanced at me over his shoulder as he lifted his glasses up the bridge of his nose easily and turned his head back to the front. I mentally let out a disappointing groan to myself. “Why...”

We got out of my building, the journey silent as ever, though there wasn’t a hint of awkwardness as I simply followed behind him. I saw his motorbike parked right at the entrance. My eyes flickered from the bike and to Mark, who was already taking out a helmet from the back. He handed it to me with a slight lift.

I took a moment to look at it. A small frown forming on my face. My sight went down to our small signatures engraved at the side, my name and his in a calligraphy font with a heart next to it. I gulped, biting my lip as the more I stared at it. The more it took me back to my memories. “I got you that when I first got my motorbike.” Mark whispered. He probably noticed how I was staring into blank space at it. I cleared my throat. “Yeah.” was the only thing I could let out, quickly wearing it on and waiting for Mark to get on before I did.

The engine started and I thought we were about to go. But we didn’t. Mark turned his head around, his helmet shield lifted up so that I could see his face. “You aren’t holding on?” Mark asked with a raise of his brows. I let out a soft “Um...” It wasnt because I didn’t know where to place them. It was the fact that I was too afraid to do so. Mark still had his eyes on me. I glanced back for a moment before ever so slowly wrapping my arms around his waist, interlocking my fingers together to make sure I was secured.

Mark simply chuckled lightly, a tone I wouldn’t expect from a situation that should have felt awkward, but it felt all to familiar. Mark faced front again and I was finally able to breathe normally after suffocating myself with his stares that have done so many things to me. Then and now. I didn’t know where he was taking me. Though I was clueless, I only had Mark to trust. And after awhile, the streets began to look familiar. The buildings and the place came into view, and I knew instantly where we were going.

“Why would you take me here?” It felt like a repeat, one mere scene from the past of our many adventures. This one however, held a little more significance than the rest. “Do you want to spend the day here?” I turned to Mark, who was already looking at me. I blinked my eyes rapidly, breathing out a quick chuckle. “You brought me here so how am I suppose to answer that. And you didn’t answer me first.” I breathed in, taking in the sight before us.

The large patch of grass spreaded out, the trees that surrounded it had its leaves and branches sway in the calm wind of the day. It gave a clear view of the sky, a mix of white and blue, the air that blowed on me like a light kiss. As expected, there wasn’t anyone here. It was just us, us and the world. No one ever came here, and so it became our own place. A place we owned all to ourselves.

“What are we going to do? It’s already lunch too...” I whispered, glancing down at my phone to check the time. I began to wonder what Jaehyun was doing, how he was coping with the fact that I suddenly ditched work today and have him work alone for the first time. “You know the drill, don’t you?” I retrieved my eyes back from the scenery and to him. I gukped hard. “Of course I do.” I turned around sharply and walked forward to the small café beside the area that housed the best desserts any place could offer.

“Oh, Mark Lee!” The old woman shouted with glee when she shot her head up at the sound of the bell ringing above the door, and upon seeing Mark in her view, her face instantly lit up with a smile, the wrinkles around her eyes showing as they formed a thin line. She didn’t hesitate to get out from behind the counter to give Mark a big warm hug like you’d give to your grandson, chuckling happily as she did so.

“How many years has it been?!” She finally released Mark out of her embrace when he kept hitting her back in a signal that she was suffocating him. Mark laughed at her excitement. “Mm two years, I think?” I knew he was just guessing and letting out a random number. “I see you’re back too, dear.” She turned her attention to me, which got me out of my observant nature to quickly flash a polite smile. “Good afternoon, Misses Jae.”

Misses Jae, the old woman who had been working at the café ever since Mark and I began coming here. She has yet to retire after all these years. And if anyone would have seen Mark and I’s relationship grow, it was her. She had always been at the sidelines, obviously spying on us and we pretended we never knew. She never caught on to us knowing about her watchful eyes either. We did stop coming a few years back when Mark began getting busy with his band career. Having her still be here felt like a breath of freah air.

“Would you like the original, loves?” She questioned bubbly, skipping to the back of the counter as she began to whip up our order that we haven’t exactly asked for. Mark and I turned our heads to each other in unison, exchanging a soft smile as the two of us had the same thought of Misses Jae. “How do you still remember what we ate? Aren’t you old already?” Mark asked, the joking tone flowed with his words followed by a giggle.

I mentally frowned, watching Mark and Misses Jae conversed. They were radiating nothing but brightness and purity, like two angels having their daily old chatters. How could things not change? It was only their age, but their personality never did. No matter how long, I’d still think they could have this kind of conversation. I brought myself back to reality from Mark appeared in front of me with the picnic basket. “Let’s go?” He questioned. I downshifted my head in response and walked away, turning back to wave a hand at Misses Jae as she cheefully bid us goodbye as well.

“Are we getting ice cream after this?” I questioned. Mark looked down to me, almost having a look of amusement plastered on his face. My eyebrows formed a V at his weird reaction. “What?” I faked my exasperation through my tone. Mark shook his head while it tilted down, cracking a soft smile. I let time froze for a moment. That simple gesture of his, anyone could do it. But his had always been natural, natural yet perfect in its state. Time went back to normal, not allowing me to sink in his looks any further. “Nothing.” Mark simply said, the walk back to the field was quiet and peaceful.

As the day went by and we ate our lunch, everything felt normal. Everything was neutral, like we were just having a regular date out. Like no strings between us have been pulled. Mark was able to keep up a conversation. And though there were pockets of silence, I was able to tolerate it. And now, as we leaned back with one hand supporting our bodies while the other held our ice cream cones, we stared off into the sky as we watch it slowly turn into pink and the burning orange sun started to brush the horizon.

“You have yet to answer why you took me here.” I reminded Mark yet again. I turned my attention to Mark. His dewy skin was covered with the shade of orange reflected from the sky. His silver-purple hair capturing all the light, like it was all shining on him, circling him like he was the only thing worthy in this world. He looked effortlessly breathtaking, his side profile being my focus while he had his eyes on the sunset.

“I have a request.” Mark breathed out, he still had his eyes on the sky that was now slowly turning into a shade of violet. “Request...?” I echoed back, letting my skepticism shine through my words. Mark glanced down, ruffling his head with his hand while taking a bite of the ice cream cone at the same time. A moment went by when he was chewing. And when he swallowed and was ready to talk again, he said, “I offer you three days. Three stops.” “For what?”

“For you to make a decision on whether you want us to start over.”

My mouth couldn’t help itself but hang open ever so slightly. Blinking twice, I took in his words, wondering, “What is he even on about?” When it came to things like these, anything that needed me to not know what was going on, Mark’s creativity knew no limits and zero boundaries. Who knows what was running through his pretty mind? “This being the first stop.”

“Are you taking me on some kind of journey?” I carelessly let out without giving much thought. To my surprise however, Mark nodded his head firmly, his head slowlh tilting down to meet my gaze. “It’s a journey back in time, a journey down our memory lane. Feelings you thought were long gone, we can go search for it again.” His whisper got lower, softened with each word as sincerity was imbued nicely in between.

At that moment, I felt an electric shock being sent throughout my whole body. And it was all Mark’s doing. From his looks, to his stare, whatever he did today. I didn’t take me long to realise that I was feeling new, like we were just getting started. When he went away for that night and we parted ways, I went empty too, like all of me just flooded out and disappeared.

Mark texted to free up my weekends, which meant that I’d still have to go for work. With the day before still vividly etched into my mind, I came to the bookstore unfocused and in a daze, absentmindedly bringing myself back to that day and having the sudden urge to replay it over and over. Of course my weird behaviour has yet again struck Jaehyun’s instincts of suspicion.

“Why didn’t you go to work yesterday?” Jaehyun asked, wanting to sound casual but I could hear his interrogation tone underneath and ready to come out after I answered. I took in a deep breath, lips thinned. “I went out... with my boyfriend.” My answer caused Jaehyun to lean back a little almost in shock, but he kept his cool regardless. “Wait. The one you broke up with?” He closed his eyes for a moment as if recalling the day when I told him about my situation. I nodded in response.

There was silence for a moment, but I quickly spoke with a, “Hey, what would you do if someone gave you three days to fall in love with them?” Jaehyun arched an eyebrow in question, glancing sideways. “I’m assuming that this is related to what happened yesterday?” I burst out a loud sigh, covering my eyes with a palm for a moment. “How are you so-”

“I know how to read people.” I clicked my tongue. “Right.”

“So what exactly did he tell you?” Jaehyun questioned me again. I puckered my lips, trying to see if I could remember Mark’s exact words. Failing to do so, I simply replied with the gist. “He’s giving me three days. We’ll go to three places. He wants to know if I’d agree to starting over our relationship after the three days.” I was looking down at my thumbs, trying to scrap off the hang nails while I talked in a whispered tone. “Isn’t that a good thing?”

I looked up to Jaehyun, dumbfounded as I got side tracked in my thinking, remembering about my day with Mark once again. Jaehyun let out a disappointed sigh. “Can’t you see, _____. He’s practically a hopeless romantic who’s trying so hard to win you over. I feel bad for that guy.” Jaehyun suddenly leaned forward against the counter, shoulders raising up to his ears while he did so. “Wait what’s his name though? I can’t be calling him ‘that guy’ all the time.”

“I thought you knew? It’s Mark Lee.” I stated monotonously. Jaehyun moved back with shock, mouth agape and eyes so wide that it could fall out of their eye sockets. “Wait! Mark Lee the guitarist from Dream?!” Jaehyun gasped exaggeratedly, both hands having to close his loose jaw shut. “Did you not remember me taking you to one of his performances?” I asked, dumbfounded at how he could forget such a memory. “You just said you knew Mark! I didn’t know you dated him!” My mouth absently formed an ‘O’ as I remembered that I did, laughing shortly after and shaking my head, muttering a, “Sorry about that.” under my breath.

“Okay back on topic.” Jaehyun began, his voice instantly switched fast back to his low, serious tone. “I mean the obvious answer is to take him back. But I’m not the one in a relationship here. So whether you do fall for him again or not within the three days, just make sure you two ended this on a good note. Not whatever you did that day.” Jaehyun rolled his eyes with his last comment. “Did you think I didn’t thought of a way to end it nicely? I tried to but it came out sounding more harsh then it needed to be. But I felt like ot was better to be straight up at that point of time.” I retorted, my voice forged by a shard of broken glass as I feigned exasperation.

“Can’t I at least have a clue of where you’re taking me?” I frowned while Mark was taking out my helmet from the back. He turned around sharply on his heels, passing me the helmet with a faint smirk that disappeared in a blink of an eye and covered with an innocent smile. “I’m not your kidnapper. All the more you should trust me. Didn’t I say we’re trying to find your lost feelings?” Mark expertly put his helmet on without any adjustments needed. “I’m your guide here.” He hopped on, the engine roaring when he started the motorbike and I got on.

The ride to the unknown location was long. I didn’t time it but it did felt long. I had my eyes halfway closed, begging to shut them fully to be put to rest as the wind blew harshly against my skin, the fast speed making the wind cold as ice which felt like air conditioning and made it the perfect condition to sleep. Too bad I couldn’t and even when I did, my head moved left and right as it hanged loose.

We finally came to an abrupt stop. My eyes were still closed at that period of time. But by the sound of bustling and busyness ringing through my ears, it didn’t take me long to have a few guesses formed in my head before I fluttered my eyes open to confirm them. “This place...” I whispered under my breath. Mark heard me and hummed as I went off and strapped my helmet off. I held the helmet in my hands while I looked from the crowdedness to the where the huge sign stood tall and above the entrance of the gates.

“We haven’t visited here in a long time, haven’t we?” I felt Mark’s presence beside me. I quickly glanced at him before directing my eyes back to the sign. “I’m surprised it’s still busy. It used to only be this crowded during the holidays.” I couldn’t help but crack a smile absently, too amazed by the sight as nostalgia washed over me. I handed Mark my helmet, eyes never leaving the place. I watched as Mark walked in front of me and I instantly followed.

What continued after that was simply a whole day of fun and joy. Endless games, prizes won. Though it had mostly been Mark winning the prizes at first, I was soon able to step up and win some too close to the end of the day. We got on rides, ate from food trucks, the plainest of desserts suddenly tasting a whole lot brighter as we simply went around and visiting everh corner of the amusement park. It was nothing but pure bliss, nothing could distract our time here at all.

“I’m not satisfied with this!” I whined, still upset at how Mark upstaged me in over half the games we played. I realised my competitive side became prominent when I played, and also the fact that I might have been competitive only with Mark. Mark folded his arms confidently, his body turning left and right while he threw his leg forward with each step on the way back to our ride. The prizes were small, but the biggest one he earned was an adorable cat plush toy which he hugged like it was his prize possession.

“You used to be better at this than I was. I remembered how you always taunted me and rubbed it in my face while I sulked.” Mark and I chuckled in unison, the memories of it being played in our minds at the same time. We were now leaning against his motorbike, a long silence passing by that felt like a cozy blanket over us, comfortable and serene. The sun was just about to finish setting to welcome the night, and in probably a few minutes time the light on the huge sign would flicker and illuminate the entire front of the entrance.

“You took me here that one time I got a stuffed toy from my friend and thought I liked going to amusement parks.” I couldn’t help but giggle, my mind teleporting me to that exact day when it happened. It replayed itself, and emotions came barreling now in full force. “How did you make such an assumption?” I turned to him, brow raised in a weirded out manner. Mark placed a free hand on his chest and feigned shock.

“It looked like a stuff toy from an amusement park and you kept talking about it in class! I just apparently made that connection...” Mark cutely whispered the ending, which I responded with a frown, surprised at how much I was swooning over his little act.

It took me awhile to notice, having my focus on Mark and the amusement park, that the sunset had always been pretty whenever I was with Mark. At the first stop and now, it was never like any ordinary day. The colours were bright, fighting each other to make themselves prominently painted in the sky. It was a burst of colours, not like your average sunset on an average day. Something about it made me think that the world’s trying to tell me, “It’s really true that the best days have the best sunsets.”

“Wanna head home now?” I flicked my mindset back to reality when I heard Mark’s voice, my head shooting towards him immediately after I stared into blank space at nature’s view. “Mm details on the next location?” It had only been two days. Two stops. With each second passing by, my curiosity to know the next stop had always been growing. It’s as if I was slowly picking up bits and pieces of my feelings through these times, and I was somehow eager to pick up more as it went on.

“The next location.” Mark echoed to himself in a whisper, slowly nodding his head while the rubbed his chin and seemed to be faking that he was deep in thought. “I want you to call me when you’re feeling sleepless. A rought night, one where you simply can’t sleep and wished that time will pass by till morning without having you be a tired mess.” Mark said it in this poetic tone, which flowed soothingly as I listened.

“Why do I already know what you’re going to do?” I asked, a slight smirk creeping up my face while a devious soft chuckle. Mark frowned, eyes narrowed at me while he shook his head. “You aren’t making it fun. At least pretend you don’t know if you guessed it right!” I was trying my hardest not to melt into the floor at the sight of Mark being a cutie. I was suddenly having a hard exterior, one that was playing hard to get but for what reason? That I didn’t know.

Mark took me home, silence throughout with only our expression and hums to communicate. I could clearly tell Mark was tired from today, and I was too, quickly taking a shower and getting ready for bed just so I could fall into it and doze off. But right before I did, my eyes caught its focus on the stuffed bear I won that was sitting on my study table. My hand absently reached out for it. I turned my body sideways and have the bear mirroring me.

It was all so reminiscent. How it was as if I relived that day years ago, which only resulted in a full chain of memories with correspondence to it. It’s like I was in a dark room, nothing but darkness to eat me up alive till Mark showed me a string, one that was slowly taking me somewhere, the destination being sure to be far better than this empty void of my heart, where I didn’t know if I actually did fell out of love with Mark, but simply needed that bit of push which Mark was doing horrifyingly well.

For some reason, Mark and I didn’t contact each other after that day. Days turned into weeks, and as time flash by like a blur, I was already waking up to be greeted with the Christmas spirit that bustled my town just in time to welcome the holidays. Though the snow has yet to come, the town had already begun hanging up decorations and lights hanging from one telephone pole to another. Though the town had greeted me with a lively atmosphere, I however wasn’t in the Christmas spirit.

Without reason, my days have slowly been feeling duller each time I awake from my sleep. Life was boring, casual. I didn’t have anything to look forward to. Eventually my mood had dropped as well. And I always felt the need to put on a smile just so Jaehyun wouldn’t suspect anything. But with him being out of the country for the holidays, I was left to handle the bookstore myself.

I was sitting at the counter, elbow resting on top of the hard wood while I allowed my chin to rest on it uncomfortably while I had my gaze down on my book, mindlessly scanning through the words. I wasn’t feeling that surge to continue reading, I didn’t bother what was going to happen next. My love for reading was suddenly fading, just a little yet still impactful enough to make my days gray. I’d usually be engrossed in a book, flipping hundreds of pages in one sitting when I had the free time.

I closed the book and turned to the back of the book, reading its synopsis. It sounded like a book I’d be interested in while I read the synopsis in my mind. I began to wonder if it was me that was having the colours of me being sucked out by the boredom of life. The book had nothing to do with this. I was simply too drained that I was carrying around a lifeless body everyday. I lifted my eyes up on my book and adverted my attention to the books on the shelves. Nothing stood out to me.

I let out a quiet sigh of frustration, now realising that the red hazed sky turned into vivid black ink after the sun had set, I figured if was a good time to lock up and head home. Misses Lee had never really specified a time for us to close the store, but at this point I could care less. I went straight back home, walking on the pathways as the colour from the lights reflected itself on the stone ground. The lights were bright and eventful, yet I felt none of it on my way back. Nothing was making my heart skip a beat, sending thrill and excitement.

I grabbed a glass of water and brought it straight to my room, carelessly sitting on the edge of my bed. I stared into blank space for a long while, taking occasional sips while I did. Absentmindedly, my eyes slowly went to my study table where my laptop was. And sitting right beside it was the stuffed toy. It was always been in my sight whenever I was in the room, but it was only now that I took in its presence. My thoughts went to Mark, the object of focus being linked to him. My eyes then went to my phone that was sitting at my side.

“Should I...” I whispered to myself. A frown formed on my face. How was Mark doing all this time we weren’t in contact? Has he been well off following the rules of his plan, only having to come to me when I called when he perhaps wanted to rush over and appear at my house like he always used to? “But what if he had forgotten?” I couldn’t let negatives thoughts to be shut out. They were always there, creeping around in the shadows on my mind. It always had to make me think of the worst possible outcomes.

Call me when you can’t sleep, a night when you just want it to pass by quickly. That was one of those nights. I refained myself from thinking twice and picked up my phone.

Mark strummed on the final note of the song, everyone’s instruments settling down as well. Jeno, being in charge of the bass guitar and having to stand next to Mark, immediately went up to him to give him a celebratory pat on the shoulder. “That sounded awesome guys!” Chenle shouted, punching his fists in the air with his drumsticks in hand.

Everyone exhanged faithful looks, including Mark as he looked down at his guitar, thanking it for the brilliant sound it produced though it was entirely Mark’s doing with his eyes by a soft blink. “Luckily I recorded that.” Jaemin ran up to his phone at the front, picking it up and going back to play it. All the members huddle around him, Jaemin instantly blasting his phone on full volume.

Smiles and sighs of satisfaction circled around, finally clapping when the video stopped. “We’re so ready for the Christmas performance!” Jisung said excitedly, bouncing on the toes of his feet. Mark suddenly had his mind filled, filled of her. He didn’t know how, she simply happened to pop in out of thr blue. The laughter and conversation the group was having blurred into the background, his thoughts coming into focus.

“Um guys?” Mark suddenly called out warily. Instant silence and focus was all on Mark, raised brows of curiosity being common in all their faces. “Can we perhaps change the venue?” Mark’s question got everyone to not respond for a beat, still processing his words and truthfully, not sure of what to say.

“I mean we still have time to change it without upsetting our fans.” Chenle said with a shrug. Soft hums came out. It settled down once Jeno made a follow up question. “Where though?” Mark responded immediately by saying her town, specifically the big lawn of grass with a small stage that was used for outdoor performances. For some reason it wasn’t in use anymore.

“You want to perform for her.” Haechan was the quickest one to let out the obvious assumption made by everyone, which resulted in devilish smirks and giggles. “You guys are okay with that, right?” Mark wanted to confirm in an unsteady tone. Everyone nodded their heads firmly with much reassurance.

“How are we not okay? We’ve been helping you out this whole time.”

I tried calling Mark. And after my fifth try, I gave up. I didn’t know what he was up to. And I felt that I wasn’t in the right place to get mad about it, but for some reason I was. He had a life to live. Perhaps he’s been busy with his band, which is entirely understandable. I was feeling pretty bored after work, deciding that I should be out of my home for once even if it was for an hour to take in the cold atmospheric air.

Wearing a thick coat, I shoved my hands into my pockets, taking small steps as my body tried to fend the cold. It wasn’t too cold that I wanted to freeze myself to death, but jt was enough to sting my exposed skin ever so lightly. As I walked down the pavement, the scraping of my boots against the cement and only my breathing to be heard, I began to notice how unusually quiet the town was. Lights were on and decorations were still hung, but there weren’t anyone to bring the holiday atmosphere come to life like any other day. Today was too quiet.

I continued to walk, slow strides and letting the sounds nature fill the silence. However, the further I walked down, the more I noticed a soft sound in the distance. It was muffled due its far distance from where I was at. But it sounded as if a concert was going on. Absently, I began to pick up my pace, simply curious if that is where all the people of the town werre at.

It was this moment I realised that looking down from my feet and lifting my eyes up, that I was indeed at a performance. Lots of shouting, cheers and jumping. Everyone was having a great time. It was held at the huge lawn of grass with one stage at the very back. I never heard of performances being held here, nor have I seem one when I moved here. The stage from my view was small, and all I could see were seven people performing a song on stage.

I was simply standing outside, listening to the music without giving much thought of who was playing since I was too lazy to get closer for a better view. I knew the song was coming to an end, which made me paint a frown on my face, hopefully they’d be playing more. It would certainly be more entertaining than my original plan of taking a stroll.

“How’d you like that, dreamzens!” The familiar voice spoke into the mic, shouting proudly. I shot my head up so fast I would have given myself a whiplash. My eyes darted to the stage, this time squinting my eyes to focus my vision while having to deal with the crowdedness of the area. “I hope you are all spending your holidays well.” Without a doubt, that voice came from one of Mark’s bandmates. It was as clear as day, recognising them within the fraction of a second.

“We’ll be performing one last song before leaving.” Groans filled the air of the crowd, which only made them laugh and giggle, specifically Mark’s unique laughter shining through and being the most prominent. I couldn’t recognise where Mark was. But when a person came walking up to the mic, tapping on it warily and coughing nervously, I knew right then and there that Mark was about to speak.

“This last song. It’s for a special someone. She’s probably not here to listen, but performing it here in her town specifically felt like the right thing to do.” Mark paused for a moment, sucking the air into his lungs and exhaling through the mic. “I love her, so much. I felt like I’ve been giving my best, but my best wasn’t her interpretation of her best. I realised that I’ve never actually been open to her. We never fought, strangely enough. We weren’t normal. I never shared to her about my hardships, simply putting on a smile and trying to be perfect person for her.”

Mark gulped, glancing away before proceeding to make eye contact with the audience. “And after what happened, I finally knew that being perfect, isn’t what makes you the most lovable and ideal person in someone’s eyes. Perfection was what drove her away. And in an attempt to get her back, I wrote this song. It’s a waste that she won’t be hearing it. She’s probably at home reading.” Mark chuckle weakly, rubbing his eye with one hand. “But I hope you all understand what I mean by that through this song. Be imperfectly perfect.”

The song began, and I already felt my heart getting heavy, full of unrecognisable and familiar emotions, clumping all into my heart and putting its weight down on me. It was a slow start, one that usually comes with a sad song. The crowd became quiet and respectful. “Even if I was hurt I never showed it. I’m so scared of seeing the end.” Mark’s soft and gentle voice settled in me as well, it made me held my breath for a moment and exhaling to grasp for air when I realised my breathing stopped. It’s his voice that always made the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck stand up straight and stiff.

“You saw the emptiness in my eyes, yet I never had the courage to show them to you.” The song was picking up its pace, coming to the chorus. I wanted to shout, show him I was here, wanting him to know that he didn’t have to imagine that I was here while performing, that he didn’t need to perform with just an image of me. But I couldn’t. The song was hitting me so hard in the chest that I wouldn’t even be able to utter a single word. “In a world where perfection was expected, you are one that made me imperfectly perfect, only in your eyes.”

The world came to a pause. From the rapid pace, slowing itself down to finally stop and freeze in time. Mark was the only one in my focus, everything else going blurry and bleeding out into nothing. I couldn’t resist the urge to hug him, wanting to reach my hand out all the way from the back. My vision became clear, and I could see Mark singing with his whole heart, with all his emotions. He told me many times performing was his way of expressing himself, and I could see that. I’ve seen that in all his performances.

I continued to listen, my tears eventually having to well itself up till I blinked down to the floor and drops of them fell to the ground, making its mark. I gulped and bit my lower lip, my vision how gone back to being blurry by the tears but I was still listening. All I needed was Mark’s voice to feel the presence of his arms around me, comforting me and letting me be free.

The moment the song ended and people were getting ready to leave after they greeted the fans, I squeezed through the crowd, being elbowed and pushed in every which way. I soldiered on and finally ended up and the back of the stage, where the whole band was huddle together in a group hug, patting their backs. I made myself known by clearing my throat. Heads shot up in my direction. Mark was in the center, head slowly tilting up and eyes widening when he saw me. He was crying, quickly wiping off his tears to make it seem like he wasn’t. But we both knew he was never quick enough.

“Mark...” Was all I could let out in a whisper and cry. The others were able to read the atmosphere after flickering their attention fron me and back to Mark, quietly going off. I slowly walked up to Mark, head tilted down. For some reason, I was too afraid to look into his eyes. I knew I’d be breaking the moment I looked into them. However, it was Mark’s hands that made its way to mine, holding them as if it was the most fragile thing in the world, caressing his thumb over my skin as if it was the smoothest thing ever.

“I didn’t know you’d come.” Mark breathed out, the two of us having our eyes on our hands that sit perfectly with each other like molds made from fate. “I guess it was fate that made us meet.” I was the first to look up, taking in his eyelashes and eyelids while he kept his gaze down. He was still running his thumb on my skin, in circles or even hovering over them. He was never intending to let go.

“Why have you never told me anything when you went through like... difficult times. Times where you needed someone to be there for you. That’s what I’m here for, aren’t I?” Mark quickly looked at me. Our eyes met and eye contact wasn’t intended to be broken either. “For one I felt bad if I were to ever bring up my problems. Like I said, or sung, I wanted to the the perfect person for you. One you need not have no worries about and someone you can depend on.”

“But that goes both ways.” “Of course it does.”

“So have you never considered that maybe I wanted you to approach me, instead of just leaving me there to fend for myself?” I began to think it over, his deep words settled in my thoughts. he was right. I thought i was being respectful by leaving him be when he kept insisting that he didnt to talk. But why didn’t i ever think that he could have wanted to be pulled out of his mess? That he kept resisting so that ill see he truly needed help. why didn’t I.. “That’s on me. I never realised. I’m dumb for not and so I’m sorry.”

A pause of silence went by, as if the two of us were recollecting our thoughs. “Mark.” I began. “I’m sorry for everything. Having you feel the need to put up a mask whenever you were with me, that night I broke up with you for you, being you. I’m sorry you felt the need to go such lengths to get me back. You didn’t need to. I just need you to be... transparent.” I couldn’t help but giggle when the sudden thought came to mind. “The adorable hopeless romantic that needs saving.”

Mark flickered his eyes from mine to other parts of my face, specifically more to my lips. He tugged on my hands, making me take a step closer to him, our chests now touching. Mark slowly brought his face close to mine, our lips brushing as he spoke and having the urge to connect them with its electricity.

“I’ll be me. And it’s fine. I went through all this in hopes that like you said that night, have the world bring us back together. I’m glad my efforts have been paid off.” Mark went closer, rubbing his nose against mine with a soft smile.

“I love you.” Mark whispered before our lips connected and sparks were sent flying. And just like in any cliché movie, the first snowfall seemed to fall right at this moment, where everything was simply imperfectly perfect.

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hubbytaeil · 4 years

Text

Kun ft. Johnny + #37 Don’t act so innocent & #38 I gotta say I’m a little surprised! & #62 Tell me what you want.

requested by @fusillicarbonara

a/n: this is trash im terribly sorry, my mind has been all over the place with exams and everything :((

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

“That’s not how you do it!” “Well, that’s how I do it!” “But you’re going to make a mess if- ““This is my kitchen, my rules! Also, get out of my face, Kun, you’re suffocating me.” “Wow, you guys are really something tonight.” Johnny’s voice resounded from the living room. “Kun, just let y/n do as she says, it’s not worth the pain.”

You stuck your tongue at Kun, continuing unbothered to care for your poorly cooked omelette. He just sighed, on the verge of giving up. “Will you listen to me just this once? I swear I’m not doubting your jurisdiction over this kitchen, I just want to give you some advice, y/n.” he almost whispered, in a calm and soothing tone, really showing you that Kun was just trying to help. You hated when people told you what to do and your friend Kun was no exception. But seeing him so concerned made you realise that listening to what he had to say wasn’t necessary a bad thing. “Alright, just this once.” You hesitantly moved aside to leave the pan to Kun, who in just a few minutes was able to make your omelette look edible. You scrunched your nose, jealous of your friend’s cooking skills. “You see? It wasn’t so bad, right?” Kun reassured with kind eyes. “No, I guess not.” You wrapped your arms around yourself, huffing like a child. “And now what’s wrong?” Kun exclaimed, letting his had rest on his hip. “Nothing, I just feel bad I don’t even know how to cook a damn omelette.” You confessed, leaning your head back against the cabinets, turning to the side to look at Kun’s magnanimous expression. Gently, he put his free hand over your shoulder, comforting you with faint rubs. “You’re going to learn, I’m sure. You’re pretty smart!” Kun replied, his other hand busy turning off the heat. He wasn’t paying any attention when you lifted up his arm to find your way into his embrace so inevitably Kun froze on the spot. “You should be my teacher then.” You murmured just below his ear, causing him to wriggle slightly at the gratuitous physical contact. “I don’t know… can you afford it? My classes are very expensive you know.” Kun joked, letting a out a strained laugh due to the embarrassment. “Maybe I can pay you back with something else.” You face was now dangerously close to Kun’s, making the ladder avoid your gaze. Your fingers forced him to face you, grabbing his jaw fiercely. “Tell me what you want.” Kun thought you were playing with him, like you always did when you two were together. You enjoyed teasing him, making dirty jokes and everything of the sort. But this time you were dead serious, with your eyes fixed on him, waiting for an answer. “Y/n, please. Don’t play these games.” “I’m not playing any game.” You affirmed, guiding your hand more and more downwards, but Kun stopped you from any further movement by blocking your wrist. You looked up at him making doe eyes that clashed with your true intentions. “You’ve been so tense lately, I can fix that.” Kun considered your proposal for a split second before slapping himself mentally. As he started rambling over how ridiculous you were acting, you took advantage of him letting his guard down, palming Kun over his jeans, only confirming that indeed your suggestion had been taken in consideration. “No need to be embarrassed.” You replied seeing his cheeks firing up, all the while lowering yourself to unbutton his pants. Kun was having a hard time trying to process the entire situation, refusing to acknowledge how turned on he was by your boldness. “Such a pretty cock.” You muttered after finally having lowered his underwear. “Jesus, y/n. Don’t say that.“ “Don’t act so innocent, Yangyang told me he caught you enjoying yourself in his room the other day.” You revealed as you commenced stroking him at a slow pace. Kun grunted, clearly irritated at the thought of his younger roommate going around a telling everyone what he saw. “That little shithead, I’m gonna-“ Kun stopped mid-sentence when you began using your mouth, taking him all in one go. He forced his palm over his mouth, trying to muffle his moans and you enjoyed seeing him struggle. Kun was beginning to relax, running his fingers through your hair, just as all of that was happening, he was reminded of a relevant detail. “Fuck, y/n. Johnny is literally in the other room, what if he hears us?” “Well, I think it’s a little too late for that.” Kun started sweating at the sight of Johnny leaning against the jamb, completely unbothered by you two getting at it in the middle of the kitchen. “I gotta say I’m a little surprised!” Johnny remarked, his eyes scrutinizing your skilled movements on his friend’s cock as he sipped his beer. “You jealous?” you questioned teasingly, removing Kun from your mouth making sigh to look directly at Johnny. “No, I’ve had my share last week, don’t worry about me.” You chuckled softly as you picked at from where you’d left off. Kun finally caught on to what Johnny was referring to. “Did you two…?” none of you bothered to give him an answer, Johnny just took another sip, letting his eyes speak for him. “Oh.” Kun never admitted just how crazy the thought of you and Johnny fooling around drove him, but it was pretty obvious when all of a sudden, he grabbed a fistful of your hair, making you go even harder, slightly choking you but you endured it. When he finally released in your mouth, you managed to swallow everything, never taking his eyes off him, giving him an image that he would’ve remembered for quite a long time. You stood up, straining the wrinkles on your clothes. “So… are we eating now or is the show still going?”

#kun imagines #kun scenarios #kun drabbles #kun fic #kun #kun smut #kun fluff #kun angst #johnny scenarios #johnny imagines #nct au #nct scenarios #nct imagines #nct drabbles

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acerine · 4 years

Note

Can I request a naruto x reader? Where she’s apart of team 7 and her and naruto was dating but they fight and break up. Which causes her to get depressed and develop an eating disorder and everyone gets worried when she shows up to train bc she looks sickly and her bones stick out badly. Just angst with happy ending? (You don’t have to write it if you’re uncomfortable with this topic. I suffer from anorexia and it’s hard to find stories on this topic. I do understand if you don’t wanna write it)

Hold Me

Pairing: Naruto x Reader

Warnings: Angst, eating disorder, like one cuss word

A/N: I don't have a problem with writing about disorders but I just get worried that i’m not portraying them properly, please reach out to someone if you are suffering. aaaand that ending wasn't as happy as I wanted but I think it works.

I don't have much knowledge on anorexia so im so sorry if I didn't write about it properly.

masterlist

uzumaki naruto

You groaned and plopped yourself on a bench near the entrance to the village, exhausted from the search for your boyfriend. He had dashed off immediately after training was finished without a word to you; again. You were getting worried due to how often this was happening, especially worried because he had been speaking to you less -- the only time you really saw him was during Team 7 training. You had asked Sasuke and Kakashi if they knew where he was going but they seemed to be just as clueless as you.

Looking up and seeing the sun set, you decided it was time to head home. He’d tell you whatever was troubling him eventually; you could only hope at least. “Nope -- don’t doubt him, he's never given you a reason to.” you softly mumbled to yourself, but the creeping heaviness in your heart told you otherwise.

As you walked through the village you felt your stomach grumble, the exhaustion from training and searching finally catching up to you. You decided to stop by Ichiraku’s -- it was on the way to your house and their ramen is rejuvenating, especially after gruesome training with Sasuke. shudder. He certainly gives training his all, the developing bruises were proof of that.

“Naruto that’s your 3rd bowl!” a voice giggled, bringing you back to reality.

Did they just say Naruto? Of course your boyfriend would be here! Why didn't you think of checking Ichiraku’s first? You quietly chuckled to yourself as you walked towards the voices, excited to finally see your boyfriend and share some ramen with him. But you certainly weren't expecting to see your boyfriend with his arm around Sakura nor did you expect to see how close their faces were

...

“Naruto...what are you doing?” your voice cracked slightly. Naruto and Sakura both halted their movements. Slowly he turned his head to gaze at you, “W-What are you doing here Y/n?”

Sakura looked guilty and avoided your gaze; immediately letting you know that she was aware of your relationship and what she was doing. “No seriously, what are you doing here with her?” you forced out, the strain in your voice becoming less evident, your anger overpowering your sadness.

“I was just catching up with Sakura, I haven't seen her since she started working with the other medical ninja!” He yelled out in an attempt to defend himself, his eyes darting away from you to his bowl. “Y/n calm down...it’s not what it looks like.” Sakura softly spoke. You scoffed, “Then why cant either of you look at me?”

No response.

After a minute of silence you had had enough, “Okay well don't stop on my behalf. Have fun with Sakura, Naruto.” Turning around, you began to walk away before feeling a grip on your upper arm, “Wait what's that supposed to mean?”

“Im pretty sure you know what it means.” Ripping your arm away from his grasp you sluggishly began your walk home, your body in pain from training and from your aching heart.

...

You closed the door behind you, locking it, and diving face-first onto your couch. The events from before finally registering in your head. Soft sobs began to fill the empty room and the couch pillows became stained with tears. What did she have that you didn't? You knew he used to have a crush on her when he was younger but you thought he outgrew it. Hell, you thought she had a crush on Sasuke, since when has she been interested in Naruto? Your mind was filled with questions.

Your stomach grumbled once again, this time louder than before. You didn't have the energy to get up and make yourself anything -- you weren't even sure if you even had food at home. Moving into a sitting position you glanced at the kitchen before getting up and heading to your room, you could eat in the morning after you slept off today’s events.

...

You woke up and slowly got ready for training; not mentally prepared to face Naruto after your break up. You felt a pang in your chest at the thought of his name -- making you aware of how difficult training was going to be. You sighed and began to make your way to the training grounds, taking a look at the kitchen. The last time you ate was yesterday morning but you felt fine, although the painful growl said otherwise. Shaking your head, you moved towards the door and left.

...

Naruto hadn’t showed up to training today. Kakashi said he had gone on a year training mission with Jiraiya. How convenient. They could both tell something was off between you two. “How about we cancel practice today? I think we deserve a day off.” Sasuke rolled his eyes at Kakashi, “And what are we supposed to do while you read a crappy book?”

“How about you two be actual teenagers for once?” Kakashi grumbled before heading off, leaving you and Sasuke alone with nothing to do. “Well since the moron and Kakashi aren’t here do you want to train with me?” Sasuke was pretty hardcore when it came to training — seriously, this kid did not know how to hold back. Training was life or death with him but you didn’t know what else you could possibly do on your free time other than wallow in your self pity, so you agreed.

Yeah, let’s just say you were better off moping in your room.

...

Your body felt so weak from training, the only fuel being emitted into your body came from a banana. You were constantly burning away calories and weren’t eating enough to refill them but you just couldn’t bring yourself to eat a proper meal. After finding Naruto and Sakura 12 months ago, you hadn’t felt hungry. Sure your body was weak and your stomach growled occasionally but you weren’t hungry. You hated how everyone said otherwise.

“Y/N are you sure you’re not hungry? You’re starting to look like a pile of bones...”

“Seriously, i think you should eat something.”

“Your movements are becoming sluggish, fix it.”

It was all you heard now. You felt fine. You looked fine. Why was everyone freaking out? Was it because you lost a bit of weight?!

Annoyed, you began to make your way to the meet Kakashi and Sasuke. Today would be the day Naruto returned and you just wanted to get it over with. Once you arrived all you were met with the usual concerned gazes from Kakashi, an indifferent Sasuke, but now you were met with a new pair of eyes. He looked good. Really good.

Fuck, you couldn’t do this. “You know what...i’m not feeling too hot right now so i’m going to head on home.” Your words tumbling out as you spun around, ready to return the way you came. But your legs crumbled from underneath you, too weak to fully support you anymore. You could hear Kakashi and Sasuke’s cries of concern but you couldn’t focus on them, you could only focus on the one person you didn’t want to. “Woah, what’s wrong?!” Came his frantic voice — his arms capturing your frame before you could fully hit the ground.

Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me.

You knew he could feel your bones, your oversized shirt no longer able to hide your secret. His eyes hardened before picking you up and carrying you to your house. You felt so tired and it felt like this was a dream. Everything was so hazy and you couldn’t fully comprehend what was going on. Did you actually collapse at the training field or did you hallucinate that? You couldn’t tell anymore.

But his hold on you felt real. His scent smelled real. What was he doing carrying you, you two broke up because he decided to get cozy with another girl.

Before you knew it you were being laid on your bed, “I’m going to go get some food, just...wait for me okay?” His voice cracked. Why did his voice crack? “Yeah uh okay...” Why were you agreeing to what he was saying? You watched as he walked away from your room, “What is going on?” you softly mumbled to yourself, attempting to regain your sense of reality. Staring up at the ceiling, you didn’t realize how much you changed in the year that you two broke up. Yeah okay maybe you lost some weight, and maybe you only left your room when it was time for training or missions, but was it really that odd?

You saw Naruto coming back into your room and sat on the bed -- it dipping under his sudden weight. He had made you some soup, surprisingly not ramen, and held the spoon up to your lips, “Eat it.” You couldn't bring yourself to argue with him so you complied. The only sounds surrounding you two were the clanging of the spoon against the bowl and your small gulps. Your stomach felt warm, you had forgotten the feeling of a full stomach.

A choked sob captured your attention. You looked up away from the bowl held in front of you and saw the tears streaming down your ex-boyfriend’s face. “Im sorry for doing this to you. I wouldn't have left if I knew this would happen.” His voice shakily cried out. You didn't know what to do, was your condition really that bad? He set the bowl onto your nightstand and cradled your cheek, his other hand wiping at his tears. “I’m so sorry.” He continuously cried out.

The hand on your cheek felt warm, it was nice. Both of his hands now wiped at your cheeks, you hadn't realized you were crying but he was wiping your tears away for you.

Maybe you were broken, maybe it was his fault, who could say? You pulled him into the bed with you and he held you in his arms -- he made you feel like you would be okay, he made you feel safe again. Sure you two had a long way to go before you could trust him but for now you were happy just being with him. Like it was before that day last year.

“Please just hold me.”

#Naruto x reader #Naruto imagines #naruto imagine #naruto shippuden imagines #naruto shippuden imagine #naruto shippuden x reader

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jhindraven · 4 years

Text

okay now that issue 6 is out and ive read the thing like 3 times, im gonna do my full review/breakdown of the zed comic and allll my thoughts on it.

no screenshots bc i dont want this to be longer than it is already, and also im not gonna talk about the art itself either. this is simply about the characters, the story, and how that relates to the lore of league itself.

all of this is my opinion, you can agree or disagree with me whatever, yadda yadda lets begin

ISSUE ONE

Probably the best one? In my opinion. The lack of expectations really helped this one not suck. Also the most consistent when it comes to characters personalities, comparing them to the in-game voice lines from league and the card game.

There are scenes in issue 1 that almost foreshadow, or at least reference, the events of Issue 6, specifically Zed looking up to the statue of Kusho, and how Zed kills Althon vs how Zed kills Kusho later on.

The dialogue between Shen and Akali is.. a little clunky? Shen’s dialogue is just a little. formal. but to the point that he sounds like he’s lecturing a stranger, not talking to a former student.

Jhin giving Zed his scalpel from 19 years ago is a neat detail that I wish they used more in the story. Sure, we can assume now that Jhin probably only got it because Kusho gave it to him at some point after releasing him- which means that the scalpel is one of the many wasted plot opportunities I’ll bring up here. Part of the appeal of that scene, if only just for me, was the idea that Jhin stole it from Zed while he wasn’t looking. I remember people pointing out background characters and being like “but what if that’s Jhin there! what if he was there all along!!” But that has now been thrown out the window.

A thing I wish they did was shown more of Jhin’s ‘performances’, even if only in a montage. To show more of the impact this had on Zed and Shen, the strain it put on them mentally and emotionally, and how it affected their relationship. But I understand time and probably page restraints. So whatever about that.

Again, I think this was the best one. Set up the story well, showed why everything happening is important for the character. Neat, cool. Let’s move on

ISSUE 2

Seeing the bodies was pretty fucked up, but tbh? That shit vibed. It’s one of those things I hoped they were gonna do and they did. The bodies looking like porcelain with gold blood?? And the peacock feathers???? Thats fuckin cool as hell. Then they never did it again.

In the flashback comes one of the worst fucking things in this comic. Yevnai.

Listen I adore Yevnai as a character, one of my favourites to come from the comic. You know, in the ONE ISSUE SHE ACTUALLY SHOWS UP IN????? She shows up as simply conflict between Shen and Zed (which never actually comes up mind you), as bait for Jhin, and for? Zed to show that he can sense magic from her kids to show that she’s been cheating on her husband with Quno the vastayan servant (bc we know Zed hates vastaya i guess?). oh and Guess What? the sensing magic thing also doesn’t show up again.

Oh and Jhin follows Zed to Yevnai’s place. But nothing happens from that.

Issue 2 was good, but just a total waste imo. A lot of plot points set up only to never happen again. Best things about it were dead bodies, Jhin’s tiny Zed and Shen puppets, and the knowledge that Shen still writes letters to Yevnai :’(

ISSUE 3

I got so fucking pissed when this issue came out, no shit. They took the events of The Man With The Steel Cane and just. Threw it out the window. I did a whole other post about my issues with it so I won’t just rewrite the same shit twice. But I had to actually stop reading and pace angrily for a bit. I HATE issue 3 bro.

The scene with Kusho :) . Good to know that was now a waste of misdirection because EVERYONE seemed to call that Kusho was still alive. What bullshit. But I’ll get to that.

The inconsistencies in character really show in this one. And that connects to it being a shitty rewrite of The Man With The Steel Cane. They probably wanted a fight between Shen and Zed by this point, being halfway through the comic, and just shoved it in there. Doesn’t mean I’m not mad about it.

Akali and Kayn’s dialogue was probably the best thing in the entire issue. I don’t vibe with Akali/Kayn as a ship personally, but it got a giggle out of me im ngl.

Akali attacking Zed. I guess yeah sure she would. Fits her whole “fuck you i wont do what you tell me shen” vibe. But SHEN? calling off the armistice between the yánléi and kinkou due to the actions of one of HIS ex-students?? Shen would never. Let’s add another point to the ‘This Is Really Out Of Character’ board!

The sworn and witnessed scene was nice, it’s what Kayn deserves. Finally knowing the Kashuri Faction was nice, too bad they never get fucking mentioned ever again I guess.

There’s so many references to The Man With The Steel Cane that they could’ve implimented so much better, especially dialogue. I can’t read the original story without feeling cheated out of what it was before Issue 3. So more wasted potential I guess.

Issue 4

This was a big step up from Issues 2-3. My personal favourite, but not the best (if that makes sense). But there isn’t too much to talk about here? Jhin sets off his bombs from the last issue, it looks cool, but there’s no real story to talk about here. There is a lot of character stuff to talk about though.

Zed choosing to save Shen over getting Jhin is fucking HUGE for Zed as a character. For a character so hellbent on vengence throughout the entire thing choosing instead to save his "hated enemy and closest friend” ?? im sobbing.

This whole comic was emotional as hell, and the most character development we ever fucking saw in this thing. From Zed’s daddy issues to the realisation that Zed’s shadows are shades of Jhin and Kusho (which is now fucking hilarious and makes no sense after Issue 6).

There was a lot of setup for plotpoints that actually did show up later for once, like Kayn being the temporary leader and all that jazz. What it had in emotion, it seemed to lack in real story progression until the end.

Issue 5

This issue was weird for me. Like there was a lot of plot and a lot of character shit that seemed so condensed that it felt like nothing. Zed’s confession in the cell-wagon and the information that Shen was out fighting Noxians too? Alright, sure okay.

Shen still seems wildly out of character for me, since we mostly know him as this beacon of peace and calm- he’s so violent towards Zed all the time it’s strange. Like he points a sword at Zed while saying that he isn’t allowed to kill Jhin, wtf

The callback to Awaken is fucking superb. Really solidifies that video into the lore of the game. Camille being mentioned had me like :hearteyes: This is a nitpick- but I wish we knew what happened at the end of Awaken. Is Camille okay? Did Jhin get injured? It was a week ago, if he did get injured- where and how did he recover so fast? Little details that I wanna know, not really for any real story purposes.

Rhaast finally showing up :hearteyes:, nothing else to add bc nothing else happened with him.

Jhin making the most of Piltoven technology is really cool, and its a scene that made me go “OH YEAH he was a stagehand for a good period of time!!” That’s what we call Tying In Pre-Existing Lore fellas.

Jhin just really shined in this issue. Really set him up to be The Big Bad of the comic, like he had a monologue and everything! Once again, though, that gets absolutely wasted by Issue 6.

Issue 6

Where do I fucking start?

Let’s start with Jhin. I don’t know about yall, but since we spent a solid 5 issues chasing after him I expected more of a dramatic fight. More like the explosions in Issue 4. But uh we got. Some fancy prop work before he got punched in the face twice and thrown on the ground. It’s What He Deserves but like you know, he deserved worse.

As much as I didn’t want it to happen, I’m disappointed they didn’t unmask him at all. His mask was still fucking pristine by the end of the fight!! Not a scratch, not a chip!! But to be fair I think we got maybe 2 pages worth of a physical fight with Jhin so,, sure. Whatever. Out goes 5 issues of setting up? Not to downplay the conflict in that scene of course, I think it was pretty cool. It was just so anticlimactic at the end like wh-

Kusho! Haha they got us good!! The dead dude is actually still alive oooo~ [heavy sarcasm]. Why. It wasn’t a good twist! It was a “oh. okay yeah sure” twist. This might be my heat of the moment response but I have no words for how cheap and absolutely horseshit that twist is. Good thing we only have to think about it for 10 pages because HE FUCKING DIES AGAIN. WHAT A WASTE!!

Whatever, whatever, thinking about it makes me so mad because they set it up barely in Issue 5? I’m just tired this actually drained me irl.

At least we have baby Kayn and good dad Zed at the end to cleanse us of that.

HEY actually did you know that they thought that Good Dad Zed was considered contoversial by Marvel’s editors?? HUH????

whatever, whatever. i’m pissed.

BONUS SHIT

So Jhin’s lore has now had an update to connect with the comic. And it’s fucking weird. Now suddenly Kusho didn’t care about catching Jhin after he found out it was just a human person murdering people? And that it was essentially Not Their Job anymore??? excuse me??

CONCLUSION?

This comic started with a good beginning and a lot of potential. It brought up so many new theories and so many new headcanons. But all that potential and all that interesting story got washed away with unconnected plot points, ‘important’ characters that show up once, and a cheap twist ending that simultaneously came out of nowhere and was easily predicted (in the bad way). It was a fun read for a while, but the ending has soured the experience I had reading it.

Some issues may come from time + page constraints, and the limitations of the medium. But those were mostly minor issues. I wanna give the artists and the writers the benefit of the doubt, maybe blame Marvel as I like to do. But...

6 months worth of waiting for an ending like this? I’m just disappointed.

#this is really fucking long im so sorry #if you enjoyed the comic- good for you. im glad you had fun. i really truely am.#i was so excited for this series.. i feel almost cheated #long post #zed comic #zed spoilers #jhin reads league

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mint-yooxgi · 5 years

Note

LOOK IM SO GODDAMN MAD SO IMA RANT TO YOU LIKE OKAY I CARE SO MUHC ABOUT KPOP IDOLS OKAY AND I KNOW THE LIFE IS HARD BUT LIKE I CANT DEAL WITH SO MANY GOOD PPL LEAVING THEIR GROUPS FIRST WOOJIN NOW WONHO AND I WANNA FUCKING DIE

So I got this ask a few hours ago, and I originally didn’t really know how to respond. To be quite honest, I still don’t. That being said, I can understand your frustrations anon, but I can’t fully agree with you here.

Your feelings are valid, and I'm not simply answering this in an attempt to push your feelings aside. However, this message just doesn’t still right with me.

To put it bluntly, to me, your message comes across as if you are saying, “despite the hardships Kpop idols face, and the mental, physical, and emotional strains that some of them undergo, they should just learn to suck it up cause I don’t want them to leave their groups/terminate their contract before it’s due.”

Whether or not this is your intention of this ask, this is my interpretation, hence why it doesn’t sit right with me. I’m sure this is not what you mean, but wording can be very tricky to me, and I am always cautious of the way I word things, and how I intemperate the words of others.

I understand you care about your idols. As do I. As do many fans. The best thing we can do during these times, is offer support and be understanding of their decisions.

Yes, the life is hard. The life is extremely hard, and I don’t think a lot of people truly grasp this concept. Please understand that the entire process of becoming an idol doesn’t just stop once an idol debuts. I would argue that it just gets harder from there. Not only do idols now have to face the glaring review and scrutiny under the public eye, but they also have to face the scrutiny and rules of their company, including all those who fall under the company whether it be fellow idols, trainers, or CEOs.

What many don’t understand, is that Korea is a heavily military influenced culture, meaning a lot of their training runs like a military regime. Not only is it severely strict, but it is also severely demanding.

Additionally, after debut, idols are constantly in a spotlight of sorts, which depends on how popular a group is. Many new idol groups debut within a year, yet only a select few actually make it past their first year, and move on to actually make a name for themselves in the industry. So, not only do they have the pressure of debuting, they are continually pressured by their companies to do well. There is always a need to strive for greatness, to become better, until eventually, you are the best. However, there will always be someone better.

The increasing competition only serves to make it increasingly difficult for newer acts. Not to mention how the public will receive and view these new groups.

Being under the scrutiny of the public eye can be seriously taxing. Korea has a very strict culture in which a majority of the population views certain acts, such as drinking, smoking, and improper conduct, as immature, repulsive, or a bad influence. So, not only are idols constantly being attacked by antis or sasaengs, they are constantly under the pressure to perform their best, act their best, be their best. That pressure can become unbearable at times.

In order to do well in the public eye, one must be charismatic, and always be on their best behaviour to perform properly and make good impressions. No one will want to work with an idol who is moody, or considered rude. This also affects how well a group does after debut. Music shows, radio shows, etc., aren’t going to want to book a group who is viewed negatively in the public eye, or considered rude, for people will not want to associate with them.

Not to mention the constant ideal of always having to look ‘perfect’ all the time. As you probably know, Korean beauty standards are very strict, so if one does not fit into the specific image of beauty that society has deemed appropriate, one can be ridiculed or attacked for their appearance. That only adds to the already enormous pressure already placed on idols to always be, and look their best.

Another thing that can be extremely important in Korea and Korean culture is endorsements. This ties back into my previous point of needing to be perceived well in the public eye. If one has a good image, one can obtain endorsements which further promote the idol or idol group in said endorsement. This adds to a popularity of a group. Doing something bad or being perceived in a negative way can not only negatively effect the group, but the idol could also loose their endorsement, and possibly never be able to use that promotional opportunity again. So, you can understand the pressure placed on them to always appear as their ideal selves.

This can all take a toll on oneself. Not only the physical toll from often times extreme schedules, but an emotional and mental toll as well. I don’t know how much you know of Korean culture, but mental health is not too popular a topic. It is not freely advertised in public. Many of the older generation still views mental illness as a taboo subject, and some even deny the existence of such conditions. Not only that, but as far as I know, there are not too many options of treating mental health efficiently that are offered in Korea at the moment. Even if one does seek help, again, it is viewed as taboo by the older generation (as far as I know), and people assume there is something wrong with you. In short, mental health is not something openly talked about easily in Korea.

Now, imagine the emotional toll this can take on someone. The constant pressure of having to appear ‘perfect’ all the time. The rigorous training and practice, not to mention some of the schedules idols are put through. Many do not have time to themselves. They have their fans to think about. They have their group to think about. They have the company to think about. They have the public to think about. I wouldn’t be surprised if at some times, they don’t even have time to think about themselves.

“But Jackie, idols know this when they agree to become trainees,”

Yes, and no. Yes, they may get told how hard it will be. Yes, they may get told about the difficult road that lays before them if and only if they can make it all the way to debut. But no one tells them of the mental and emotional toll that this life can take on them.

Sometimes, even though you are upset about your fav leaving their group, take a moment to just sit back, and breathe. Think about the good times and happy memories you have had with them while they were in the group. It’s not the end of the world, believe me. I know it can be difficult, but sometimes this is for the best.

The best thing we can do is love and support our idols no matter what they choose to do. We don’t always know the full story. We don’t always get to see the truth.

We, as fans, should strive to understand our idols, and support them in their times of need. After all, there are much worse things than an idol simply leaving their group. This doesn’t mean their career has stopped. At this point, it is up to them to choose what to do, whether they want to continue in the spotlight after some time off, or retire completely, is up to them.

I’d rather see idols take time off for themselves, because I don’t know about you, but the other alternative is much worse in my opinion.

And whether the last part of your statement is true or not, anon, joking about it isn't the way to go.

#ask #I'm ranting #admin's thoughts #Just my opinion #sorry for the long post btw #sigh

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iffeelscouldkill · 5 years

Text

Good For Morale

After three and a half weeks of working on this fic and countless distractions, revisions and moments where I had to bribe myself into working on it, it’s finally finished! Here is my longest TSCOSI fic to date, and it’s all about Sana Tripathi. I love that woman.

Of course because I’m me, there’s bonus Arkady/Violet and a bit of Brian/Krejjh, but mostly it’s wall-to-wall Sana Feels and my attempts to get inside her head, understand her character and play out her relationship with Campbell. I really dig their flirty chemistry, and I’m excited to see what their relationship becomes in the podcast :D

This is set post-episode 9, and contains my very vague and bad guesses about things that could happen in episode 10. I look forward to finding out how wrong I am!

Summary: After a daring escape from the IGR, the crew of the Rumor is en route to Telemachus. Sana is preoccupied over an impending reconciliation with Campbell, trying to navigate their suddenly strained relationship, and understand her own feelings towards her old friend.

It would help if she could stop walking in on her crewmates making use of the hammock in the mess hall.

Read on AO3

It wasn’t uncommon on the Rumor to run into Brian and Krejjh being cuddly and sickeningly cute in any given part of the ship.

They spent most of their time either up in the cockpit or in their shared room, but Sana had stumbled across them in the kitchen, the engine room, the medical closet – even her own room during one infamous incident where Brian and Krejjh’s bunk was being fumigated for asteroid ticks. (Brian had apologised profusely for that one).

It wasn’t that they were into public displays of affection so much as they just couldn’t seem to help themselves, thought Sana wryly. And now they were occupying the makeshift hammock she’d constructed out of safety harnesses and string in the middle of the mess hall.

Good for morale, indeed. It wasn’t like she’d ever walked on them doing anything more than PG-rated (not like that time with Arkady’s one-night-stand on Telemachus - god, they were drunk that night), it was just – a little distracting sometimes. Especially at 6 o’clock in the morning, ship’s time, when she’d rather been hoping to eat her breakfast in peace. Sana stood there for a moment, holding her steaming bowl of congee (real congee, not the stuff from the depths of the store cupboard that Arkady sometimes tried to pass off as congee), and settled on a cheerful, “Morning, guys.” One of Krejjh’s pairs of eyes flicked towards her, and they nudged Brian to get his attention. Brian broke away from Krejjh and looked up at Sana, smiling. “Oh, hey, Captain. Didn’t expect to see you up so early.”

“I could say the same about you both,” Sana pointed out. Brian gave his signature loose shrug and a genial smile. “Krejjh’s shift just ended and I was nappin’ in the cockpit, so we both decided to come down here for a change of scene.” “This hammock really does hold weight a lot better than I would’ve expected, all things considered,” Krejjh added brightly. “The more you know!” “That is good to know,” Sana agreed dryly. “Anyway – we’ll leave to your breakfast,” Brian said, hopping up and holding out his hand to Krejjh to help them up. “Aww, but I was comfortable.” Pouting, Krejjh allowed themself to be hauled out of the hammock, keeping their hand intertwined with Brian’s as the two of them left the mess. “See you later, Cap’n!” As the door slid shut behind them, Sana looked thoughtfully at the hammock. After a moment’s indecision, she smiled to herself and sat down, then swivelled to the side and attempted to swing her legs up into the hammock. It was at that moment that the (very hot!) bowl of congee she’d balanced on her lap slid perilously and threatened to spill all over her legs – reminding Sana why she’d stopped using the hammock in the first place.

The second time it happened was only a week later. This time, it was Sana who’d been needing a change of scene. She’d been more or less cooped up in her room since they’d returned from the supply run on Thalassa. Her isolation wasn’t deliberate; she’d just been trying to prepare herself for– well. Anyway, she’d gone down to the kitchen and raided what was left of those “strange flavor” Chinese snacks Violet had bought to see what they tasted like (the rest of the crew hated them, but Sana kind of liked them) and wandered into the mess to find– It was Violet and Arkady this time, Arkady lying in the hammock with Violet propping herself up on her hands above her. She was giggling, and Arkady was looking up at her with an expression that Sana had never seen on her best friend’s face before. It was fierce, loving, and protective all at once; there was a sort of longing there, but also a having, and a wonder at the place she’d found herself, all at the same time. Sana thought that it must be what coming home looked like. The sight caused an unexpected stab of loneliness to run through her. She was beyond thrilled for her best friend, really – it was about damn time that Arkady had got her ass in gear and acted on her very obvious feelings for their resident Science Officer. The entire crew had cheered when Violet grabbed Arkady and kissed her during the Rumor’s break-neck escape from New Jupiter and the IGR. Sana was pretty sure she’d cheered loudest of all. But… It was one thing to see (and hear) Brian and Krejjh acting coupley around the ship and know that she could still knock on Arkady’s door in the dead of night sometimes and complain about the futility of romantic relationships, or get a little drunk and confess to her best friend that she was afraid of being alone, and have the two of them make a pact that they would always be there for each other. It was another thing to be reminded that she was the only one on the ship that hadn’t found someone. She began backing out of the room, but Violet must have caught the movement on the periphery of her vision. She looked up, and blushed bright red as she realised that they had an audience. “Oh! S-Sana, hi!” Arkady twisted around underneath Violet and attempted a wave, completely unselfconscious. “Hey, Captain. Look, we’re using the hammock! I can feel my morale improving already.” “Right,” said Sana distantly. She knew she sounded strained, but couldn’t quite figure out how to make her voice… not be. “That’s good. Don’t let me interrupt.” She turned and left the mess hall.

Arkady watched Sana leave, then turned to frown at Violet. “What was that about?” Violet sat back on her heels, looking concerned. “Sana has been really withdrawn lately. I feel like I’ve hardly seen her since we left Thalassa. Has she spoken to you?” Arkady shrugged as best she could in her horizontal position. “Not really.” She mentally reviewed the last several days – and then remembered the cargo that they’d picked up on Nereid.

“Oh, right. We’re due to call on Campbell in Telemachus, and it’s gonna be the first time that Sana has seen him since we skipped out on our stop to go rescue you, and then, y’know... accused him of double-crossing us. I guarantee she’s stressing about it.” “Crap,” said Violet, and Arkady fought off a smile at Violet’s mild curse words. Then again, she’d also heard her curse fluently and extremely impressively in Mandarin when Arkady came in bleeding from a gunshot wound to the side, so she supposed it was all relative. “But surely he gets it, I mean – our lives were under threat. There was no possible way to know who was after us. And Sana was just trying to protect her crew.” “Yeah, but you know Sana,” Arkady said wryly. “She takes this stuff to heart. And she and Campbell, well… they go pretty far back.” Violet nodded, biting her lip. Her mouth was red and tempting, and Arkady would have loved to wrap the intimate moment back around them and carry on, but she couldn’t leave Sana to get lost in her own head and overblown sense of responsibility. “I should go after her,” she said regretfully. “Not to ditch ya right in the middle, but...” “No, it’s fine, this is important. You should go and talk to Sana,” said Violet. She leaned down to press a quick kiss to Arkady’s mouth. “I’m not going anywhere.”

How the hell did I get so lucky? Arkady wondered, staring up at Violet. It was only when Violet asked, “What?”, her cheeks growing pink again, that she realised she’d been gazing in silence for about a minute with a dopey smile growing on her face.

“Nothing,” said Arkady hastily, scrambling out from under Violet and hopping to her feet. “Wish me luck – I’m about to go and talk about feelings.”

“You’ll live,” Violet told her drily.

Sana had only been sitting down on her bunk for a few moments when her door slid open to admit Arkady. She looked up in surprise.

“Arkady,” she said, frowning slightly. “Look, you didn’t need to come after me, Violet-”

“Is this about Campbell?” Arkady asked, wasting no time in getting to the point.

“Is what about Campbell?” Sana asked. She knew better than to play dumb with her best friend, but to have answered Arkady’s question with anything else felt like too much of an admission. That she was more preoccupied than she’d been letting on.

“You barely leaving your room, acting closed off, freaking out when you walked in on Violet and me just now. Given that you’ve walked in on me in way more compromising positions-” Arkady smirked at the memory, “I figured something else was bothering you. And we’re due to land on Telemachus in just a few days.”

Sana sighed. “Yeah, it’s been on my mind.”

“Look,” said Arkady, sitting down next to Sana. “You were doing what you thought was best for your crew. We had no other suspects! We sure as hell weren’t going to jump to ‘invisible robots in the air’ as the obvious source of our leak. Sometimes you just have to make a call – Campbell of all people should understand that. If he doesn’t, fuck ‘im. We can find other contacts.”

“I know,” said Sana. “I’m not second-guessing my decision; I know it was the right one. But Campbell isn’t just another customer. I want to fix things with him. I’m just not sure how.”

“He agreed to take our cargo from Nereid, though, right? Was he hostile when you spoke to him?”

“Not exactly.” Sana thought back to the short conversation that she’d had with Campbell not long after their flight from the IGR.

“Computer. Outside call. Sana Tripathi to Ignatius Campbell.”

“Attempting connection!” chirped ELLA, and this time, Sana just about suppressed her flinch at hearing Emily Craddock’s voice coming out of her computer. It was going to take her a little while to stop associating it with everything that had happened.

“Sana.” Campbell picked up immediately. Sana had timed the call for late evening on Telemachus, when she’d known Campbell would be available, but she was still gratified and a little relieved. “What’s happening? I heard about what happened on New Jupiter. Are you safe? Is your crew safe?”

“We’re all fine, Campbell,” Sana replied. She tried to keep the weariness from her voice, but didn’t think she’d succeeded. After a moment, she admitted, “Just tired.”

“I’m… glad to hear that,” said Campbell slowly, and there it was – the awkwardness she’d expected. Sana held back a sigh, and tried to think of what else to say. Campbell beat her to it.

“You know, you could have called. If you’d needed… anything. A hiding place. Somewhere to rest. Supplies. I… I know I said that there wasn’t much point in us talking – I said that in the heat of the moment. But you should know that you can always call.”

“I do know,” Sana told him. She might have felt uneasy about having accused Campbell of double-crossing them, but she still knew that if they’d needed a friend, or someplace to lie low, Campbell would have come through for them. “It’s not that I didn’t trust you, Campbell – but it wasn’t safe. We were on the run, and the last thing I wanted was to lead the IGR to your door.”

“Oh,” said Campbell, in a tone that Sana couldn’t identify. “I see.”

“It wasn’t that I didn’t trust you,” Sana emphasised again, because she felt that it was worth repeating. “I knew… I know that you didn’t sell us out to the IGR.”

Campbell was silent for a little while, and Sana wished that she could see his expression. Most state-of-the-art intergalactic comm systems had holotech that would allow you to view the person on the other end, but nothing about the Rumor was state-of-the-art. It hadn’t seemed like a function worth splurging on, especially as they preferred for many of their contacts not to be able to identify them.

“Okay,” Campbell said eventually. “I appreciate that. Did you manage to find the source of your leak?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it was… unexpected,” said Sana. “It’s kind of a long story to explain over a call, but… I could tell it to you in person.”

There was another pause. “Are you guys near Telemachus?”

“We’re actually just about to call in on a contact in Nereid,” said Sana. “They’ve got some cargo that I think you might be interested in.”

“Oh,” said Campbell again, a flat note in his voice. “So, this is a business call.”

“I was hoping it could be a catch-up between old friends,” Sana said cautiously.

Campbell said nothing, and Sana began to wonder if their relationship really was beyond repair. It hurt that something like this could have come between them; when you were a group of smugglers on the wrong side of the law, true friends were few and far between, but she’d never hesitated to count Campbell as one of them. He was allowed to call her Sana; most of their contacts would have been swiftly excommunicated if they’d tried. (She still called him Campbell, despite his insistences, but that was one of those friendly-banter parts of their relationship that she’d always enjoyed, and she thought he did too).

She’d met his family, and the nephews he adored; he’d met her crew. But maybe none of that mattered as much as she’d thought.

She resisted the urge to prompt Campbell or check whether the connection was still active. Finally, Campbell said, “Nereid isn’t exactly in the neighbourhood. You’d have a pretty long trek to get out here.”

Sana stiffened. “If you’d rather we didn’t make the trip-”

“No, no, that’s not what I meant,” Campbell cut in quickly. “But you’d be going pretty far out of your way just to call in on little ol’ me. What’s the cargo?”

“Four cases of Nereien chocolates,” said Sana. “I got them at a pretty good rate.”

“Those are my favourites,” Campbell said, and she could hear the surprise in his voice. “They’re rare, too.”

“Call it a peace offering,” Sana replied.

“You don’t need to make peace with me, Sana,” said Campbell. “You never did.”

This time, it was Sana’s turn to say nothing. After a few moments, Campbell said, “Call me when you’re on the approach, and I’ll come meet you at the landing site.”

“I…” Sana had been about to say, ‘I’ll look forward to it,’ but she wasn’t sure how it would be received. She settled for, “Thank you, Campbell. I’ll be in touch. Sana Tripathy out.”

“It was hard for me to get a read on him,” Sana told Arkady. “There were a lot of awkward silences, and… I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He told me before that he wasn’t angry at me, and I believe him, but he seemed… disappointed, maybe? Or, not disappointed, but… like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop. I guess I can’t blame him.”

Arkady’s mouth twisted, but she said, “Honestly, I think you’re over-thinking this, Sana. If he says he’s not angry, and he’s still willing to trade with us, then what’s the issue? Things are bound to be kind of awkward, but that doesn’t mean there’s anything else going on here. You guys can clear the air in person once we land on Telemachus.”

Sana sighed. “Yeah, I know. It’s just-” She hesitated, and then forged ahead with the other thing that had been bothering her. “Remember how you said that Campbell seemed friendlier than usual, when we called him to ask for new IDs? Almost like he was… hitting on me?”

“Yeah,” said Arkady with a smirk. It faded as she put two and two together. “It seemed suspicious, combined with the fact that we didn’t know who our leak was – evidence pointed to Campbell being the source. But if he wasn’t, then…”

“Then I guess he was just… hitting on me?” Sana said uncertainly. “And I don’t really know what to make of that. You’ve always teased me about how friendly we are, about how one day I’ll ‘ride off into the sunset to grow tomatoes with Campbell’-”

“Okay, I said that one time,” said Arkady. “But in general – yeah. You guys are close. Closer than the rest of us. I’m friendly with him, and he and Krejjh have that weird spicy-food rapport, but that’s all through you. You guys are the ones who have the… connection. Let’s face it, we wouldn’t have gotten half the discounts that we did over the years if it wasn’t for you.”

“So… What do you think I should do about it?”

Arkady laughed. “The hell if I know! Shit, Sana, you remember who you’re talking to, right? Arkady ‘one night and run’ Patel? I have no idea how Violet and I are even still together.”

Sana laughed as well, and felt the knot that had settled in her chest after she’d walked in on Arkady and Violet finally begin to ease. She’s still your best friend, she thought. She’s still Arkady. She hasn’t left you.

“Don’t do yourself down,” she told Arkady. “You and Violet are great together. I know you guys will make it work.”

“I appreciate the vote of confidence,” said Arkady drily, and Sana knew that this was her way of deflecting the conversation away from a route she wasn’t yet ready to go down. “But, back to you and Campbell.”

Sana sighed. “It’s probably a moot point, anyway. Even if he was, well, flirting with me… I’ve probably messed it all up. Nothing kills a potential romance like accusing the other person of collaborating with the IGR.”

“So, uh,” Arkady shifted uncomfortably, which Sana knew was a sign of her gearing herself up to tackle Feelings. “Is this a potential… romance? Or… was it?”

“Maybe?” Sana admitted, shrugging. She could feel herself blushing slightly. “I mean, it’s Campbell. You joking about us settling down always seemed like… a joke. But he’s – funny, and sweet, and the world’s most devoted uncle. And he’s never let us down. I didn’t think he’d sold us out because I didn’t trust him, I thought it because I know what horrors the IGR is capable of.”

“I thought it because human beings are assholes,” muttered Arkady. Sana raised an eyebrow at her. “Okay, not the point, I know. Look-” She shifted uncomfortably again, like she was sitting on hot nails, with a pained grimace to match. “If things go… well… with Campbell, and he doesn’t hate you – which I bet you now that he won’t, because it’s you – then you can decide what to do from there. Maybe try just… asking him out to dinner?”

“Ah, romantic tandem eating,” Sana joked. “What could go wrong?”

“Hey, at least Campbell’s not a Dwarnian,” said Arkady in amusement. “He’s not gonna go inviting the rest of the crew.”

“God, it’s a miracle those two ever got it together,” Sana said fondly, enjoying the temporary change of subject. “You might think you’re bad at giving love advice, but I guarantee that you’re better at it than Krejjh.”

She expected Arkady to laugh, but instead she looked thoughtful. “I think you’d be surprised, actually,” she said, but refused to elaborate, no matter how much Sana needled her.

True to his word, Campbell was there waiting for them when the Rumor touched down on Telemachus. Sana’s conversation with him on the approach had been brief, but friendly, which gave her hope. Now that she was listening for it, she thought that he sounded warmer when talking to her, compared to the way that he addressed the rest of the crew. But maybe she was reading too much into things.

He was standing a safe distance away from the landing point, one hand in his pocket. As the hatch popped open and began to lower, he raised one hand in a cheerful wave, grinning broadly.

“Well, he doesn’t look mad,” Arkady muttered to Sana. “Unless he’s planning to kill us with kindness. Also, is it just me, or is he kinda dressed up?”

Sana had been thinking the same. Campbell was wearing what looked like a black leather jacket, and a pair of dark jeans that appeared brand new – a far cry from his usual worn overcoat and patched cargo pants. He was wearing the same heavy, steel-toed work boots as ever, but she could have sworn that he’d cleaned them up a bit.

They weren’t the only ones who’d noticed. “Campbell’s looking sharp,” Brian commented cheerfully from behind her. Sana glanced over her shoulder to find him smiling expectantly at her.

“Uh, yeah, I guess he is,” she said. Krejjh looked between the two of them, obviously trying to grasp the unspoken subtext of their exchange. As Sana descended the ramp, she heard them whisper with a characteristic lack of subtlety,

“Oh! Is this a human courtship ritual?”

“Maybe, dude,” said Brian, and Sana fought off the urge to cover her face with her hand. Instead, she called out, “Hey, Campbell.”

“Sana,” he said as she came closer, and there was definitely a warmth in his voice and in his eyes that hadn’t always been there. “It’s good to see you. How was your trip? Did you have any problems at the checkpoint?”

Sana shook her head. “The credentials that you sent ahead for us worked like a charm, thanks. We probably shouldn’t hang about here for too long, but as of right now, the IGR isn’t actively on our tail.”

“Well, thank heaven for small mercies, then,” said Campbell drily. “Follow me, and we’ll get- uh, is the rest of the crew staying on the ship?”

Sana looked behind her and saw that the rest of the crew was still clustered at the top of the ramp, watching them. Krejjh was grinning madly.

“Oh, for the love of God,” Sana muttered. Obviously, someone had come up with the bright idea to give them some ‘alone time’, and they were all being fantastically unsubtle about it. “No, they’re coming,” she told Campbell, shooting Arkady a look that said Get over here, or else.

Arkady sauntered down the ramp, closely followed by Violet and Krejjh, with Brian bringing up the rear, his arms piled high with the boxes of chocolates that they’d picked up on Nereid. “Hey, Campbell. How’s it been going?”

“Pretty uneventful, apart from aiding and abetting the odd fugitive here and there,” Campbell said with a wry smile. “How about you?”

“The same. Totally uneventful,” Arkady deadpanned.

“This trip is the most exciting thing that’s happened to us all year,” Brian put in, brightly.

“Well, I can’t tell you how honoured I am,” joked Campbell, as Krejjh snickered. Campbell’s gaze landed on Violet. “And you must be the new recruit.”

“Violet Liu. It’s nice to finally meet you, Mr. Campbell,” said Violet politely, shaking Campbell’s hand.

“Likewise. I’d tell you to call me Ignatius, but even Sana refuses to, and I’ve known her for six years,” said Campbell ruefully. “Still, just ‘Campbell’ is fine. Anyway, as you said, Sana, we should probably keep moving – if you’ll all follow me, I’m parked nearby. It’s a five-seater, so we might have to get creative with the seating arrangements.”

“I can sit on Krejjh’s lap,” Brian offered, and Sana thought she caught a brief look of disappointment on Arkady’s face. She smirked.

Everything seemed completely normal between the six of them that evening, from the ride in Campbell’s car to going out for dinner and drinks. Campbell had a knack for picking the most unlikely hole-in-the-wall eateries that looked terrible but served almost unfairly delicious food, a different one each time.

Sana mostly sat back and observed as the others chattered and dug in, watching Campbell’s eyes crinkle as he drew Violet into conversation, watching as he pulled a bottle of hot sauce out almost unseen and passed it to Krejjh, who crowed and immediately began to empty it over everything. She watched Arkady teasing Brian over his bizarre food combinations, goading him into trying a strange-looking tropical fish that sat in the middle of the table.

At one point, she caught Krejjh looking at her enquiringly with one of their pairs of eyes, the other pair fixed on Violet as she attempted to – slightly tipsily – explain some complex biological concept. She smiled to let them know that she was fine, and quickly reapplied herself to her food.

She had a tendency to forget how astute Krejjh really was, and how much they tended to play up the ‘dumb alien who doesn’t understand human social conventions’ for effect. Maybe Arkady was onto something.

The truth was, she was enjoying just seeing her crew get the chance to take a breather. They hadn’t really stopped since their flight from the IGR, not daring to stay put for long on any one planet or moon – even once they were fairly sure that the Regime had given up pursuing them, too busy trying to contain the unfolding situation on New Jupiter.

They’d never been able to feel safe anywhere. Until now.

Thinking this, she looked up at Campbell, only to find him already watching her with a smile on his face.

When it came time to buy the next round of drinks, Sana volunteered, making her way to the bar and attempting to get the bartender’s attention. After she’d finally succeeded in making their order, she leaned on the bar – and jumped as Campbell came up next to her.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to catch you off-guard,” he said apologetically. “I called your name, but the patrons of this place’re… not the quietest.”

Sana laughed a little. “It’s fine. Guess I’m still a little on edge.”

She smiled up at him, and there was a pause. Again.

“I, uh, I thought you might want a hand carrying those drinks,” Campbell said.

“Oh, yeah, sure,” said Sana. The bartender was beginning to line the drinks up on the bar for her, still filling the enormously tall glass belonging to Krejjh, because Dwarnians processed human alcohol in very different ways (and quantities). If Sana wanted to speak to Campbell in private, now was the time.

“Listen, I-” she began at the same time as Campbell said, “I was wondering-”

“Oh, uh, you go first.”

“No, please.”

Okay then. Sana gathered her courage – ridiculous, that this should feel more intimidating than facing down the Fowleys - and asked, “Will you go to dinner with me tomorrow night?”

Campbell looked momentarily surprised, then chuckled. “And here I was about to ask you how long you’re planning to dock on Telemachus, as a roundabout way of working up to the same question,” he said. “Yes. I’d love to have dinner with you, Sana.”

Sana let Campbell be the one to choose the restaurant, conceding to his more up-to-date knowledge of Telemachus and his excellent taste in eateries. The following night, sat across from Campbell in a cozy little restaurant with her mouth full of the best beef rendang she’d ever eaten, she knew she’d made the right choice.

“Campbell, this is incredible,” she enthused, not even caring that her mouth was full. Campbell laughed, digging into his own bakmi goreng.

“How do you always know such good places to eat?” Sana demanded. Campbell shrugged.

“I didn’t get where I am without knowing how to make connections, and you’d be amazed at how much more open people are to doing business after a plate of really good food,” he said. “But I’m also not gonna pay through the nose for them to get blinded on moonshine and puke it all up later that night.” Sana almost choked on her mouthful as she started to laugh. “So, I look for establishments that don’t charge too much. And mind their own business.”

“So, you’re picking up the tab for tonight, then?” Sana asked playfully.

“I figured we could haggle,” Campbell replied, deadpan, and Sana laughed again.

She’d been worried about a dinner with just the two of them becoming stilted and formal, but so far it had been anything but. Determined to avoid the clichéd “outfit crisis”, she had dressed more or less the same as she did on the ship, minus her trusty wide, yellow tool belt with its hundreds of pockets, and a few engine oil stains. She missed its reassuring weight around her hips, though she was wearing a wide black belt to make up for it, with a vest and her signature knee-high boots (or as Arkady called them, her “space pirate boots”) over a loose green blouse and neopolyfibre jeans.

Arkady had performed an exaggerated double-take when she saw Sana. “Wow, Sana, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you without a wrench in your pocket before,” she said with mock surprise.

“That’s not true,” said Sana lightly. “Remember when we infiltrated that ball held by Commander Grandwin on Qilin?”

“No,” said Arkady deliberately. “I don’t remember. I’ve repressed it. That corset was hideous.”

“You looked good in it.”

“I couldn’t move in it! And I had nowhere to put my weapons. I had to strap a gun to my garter.”

Violet, who had been listening in on their conversation while brewing a pot of coffee, suddenly looked very interested. “Sorry, you strapped a gun to your what?” she asked in amusement.

“Uhhh…” Arkady froze, torn between playing to her girlfriend’s clear interest and denying any recollection of the incident in question. Sana winked at Violet.

“Tell you what, after we set off from Telemachus I’ll find us a nice formal ball to go to, and Kady can give you a real-life demonstration.”

“You’re dead to me,” Arkady hissed at her. Sana waved cheerfully at her and left the kitchen.

When Campbell had seen her, the first thing he’d said was, “Is it clichéd if I say you look nice?”

Sana grinned. “A little, but sometimes clichés are good.”

She’d been expecting at least a few minutes of awkward small talk at first, but no sooner had they sat down at their rickety little table than Campbell said,

“So, you’ve met my buddy Red Gregor – was he favouring his left leg, by any chance, when you saw him?”

“Uhh…” Sana tried to cast her mind back. Most of what had happened on Elion was a blur of her breaking the speed limit while Arkady tried to coach Violet through the Carmen Gambit, but she remembered Red Gregor after a bit: a thin-faced man who looked to be half-Chinese, half-Latino, and spoke with a strong Irish twang. He had, in fact, walked with a slight limp.

“Sure, I think he said it was prosthetic?”

“It is,” Campbell confirmed. “But what’s really funny is how he got it…”

After Elion, though, it didn’t take them long to get onto the topic of the “leak” aboard the Rumor. Campbell said, “Listen, I swear I’m not bringing this up because I’m angry with you, because I’m not-”

Sana tensed, and put down her fork. “Honestly, Campbell, you have every right to be,” she said. “I… I should have trusted you more. It wasn’t that I didn’t – it was that I was afraid of what the IGR might do to get their way. If it hadn’t been for my crew, I could’ve-”

Campbell held up a hand and shook his head. “If I didn’t know by now that you’d do anything to protect your crew, I’d be a damn fool,” he said. “I got that. And maybe if I’d been more level-headed… I could’ve helped you guys in some way. I know; you said it wasn’t safe. But I’ve had some time to think about this, and it bothered me, thinking that maybe I could have done more.

“What you said, about the people I care about – my nephews – and what I’d be willing to do to protect them… You were right. I really don’t like to think about what I’d be willing to do.” Campbell’s voice wavered slightly, and he cleared his throat. “But I also know that they’re not the only ones I’d… do almost anything to keep safe.”

Sana looked at him uncertainly. Campbell shook his head.

“That came out – that wasn’t what I meant to say. Look, I know I sounded angry on our call, and I know you’ve convinced yourself it’s because you all ‘screwed me over’ and did me out of what I was owed, and that I’m somehow keeping score.” Campbell said all this not angrily, but with a quiet intensity that nevertheless made Sana a little nervous.

“But that’s not it. If I was angry, it was because this is what the IGR always does – it sows fear, paranoia, and distrust. Even among people like us. And I was angry because… because you were light years away from me, in some kind of trouble, and there wasn’t a damn thing that I could do to help you.”

But I also know that they’re not the only ones I’d… do almost anything to keep safe. Campbell’s words suddenly made sense to Sana, and her mouth opened in surprise. Before she could say anything, Campbell said,

“I know you don’t think of yourself as someone who needs help or protection. And I’d never try to force it on you, but... You should know that it’s not always about favours and deals, owing someone or being owed. Sometimes, it’s just about people caring about you.”

Sana’s throat closed up, and she looked down at her mostly-finished bowl of food. The truth was that he was right; before a few weeks ago, she would have baulked at the idea of needing protection from anyone. She let Arkady watch her back, but that was different. She looked out for Arkady as much as Arkady looked out for her, even if Arkady didn’t realise it. Not all kinds of protection involved putting yourself between someone else and a bullet.

She’d always prided herself on being tough and self-sufficient. She’d built her reputation up from nothing; she had to be. She hated to be in anyone’s debt, because in her experience, you never knew when and how they might choose to collect. As a woman – above all, a brown woman – trying to make her way in a cutthroat world, she had to be that much more invincible.

But she thought about the way that Arkady had shoved her shoulder into Sana’s on the Gay Louisa to get her out of range of one of the security bots. She thought of the way, on New Jupiter, that Violet’s mouth had pressed into a line and she’d pressed Sana down into a chair with surprising strength and held her there while she treated her injury. She thought about seeing Brian wielding a gun for the first time, his face intent, and of Krejjh gunning the ship into overdrive to get all of them to safety.

Maybe she was learning that it was okay to let her friends look after her too.

“I’ve overstepped – I’m sorry,” said Campbell in a rush, and Sana looked up at him, coming back to herself. “I shouldn’t have-”

“No, you haven’t overstepped,” said Sana quietly, and he stopped. “I… think you’re right. And…” Campbell waited as she gathered her thoughts.

“And I think I understand what you were trying to tell me before,” she finished. “About not keeping score. It’s hard for me to make an exception to those rules, but… I can try.” She gave Campbell a half-smile. “I’m not used to being on the receiving end. Of having other people try to protect me. But maybe I’m beginning to get that it’s a two-way street.”

“I’m more than willing to help show you,” said Campbell, with such quiet sincerity that Sana felt herself blushing.

“Thanks.”

Sensing the need to lighten the tone a little, Campbell said jokingly, “Of course, don’t think this gets ya out of bartering the next time you have cargo to offload.”

“Why would I miss out on the chance to take advantage of your atrocious negotiating skills?” Sana returned easily. Campbell snorted in spite of himself, and then pretended to clutch at his chest as if mortally wounded.

“You’ve cut me to the quick, Captain Tripathi.”

“You were right about something else, too,” Sana said, remembering. “Not that any of us would have guessed, in a million years…”

At Campbell’s look of confusion, she explained: “On our call, you said – something like, ‘You’re flying through space. We’re light years apart, and we’re talking. Someone from three hundred years ago wouldn’t be able to comprehend it.’ You were talking about other possible explanations for our leak, and as it turned out, that was it. That was the explanation.”

Campbell raised an eyebrow. “I’m going to need something much stronger for this story, aren’t I?” he asked, gesturing to his glass of wine.

“Significantly,” Sana agreed.

They got through several glasses of a strong local spirit (it had nothing on engine-room moonshine, but was strong enough for Sana to feel its effects) as Sana told the whole story: about the swarm, Emily and Alvy’s discoveries, Thasia and the Other Violet, the way they’d pieced everything together, Violet’s Plan B, and their final confrontation and flight from the IGR. She spoke in low tones, their conversation easily drowned out by the loud chatter of the other patrons.

Campbell listened spellbound, occasionally swearing quietly (or not-so-quietly) in response to a development in the tale. He had always been a good audience – normally she and Arkady would take it in turns to tell stories about their exploits, Arkady mostly contributing sarcastic commentary at first until the moonshine loosened her up enough that she would take over narrating, Krejjh chiming in at appropriate – or inappropriate – moments with an exclamation or an oddly specific detail.

It felt strange to be telling it on her own, but enjoyable, too. When she described Violet grabbing Arkady and kissing her as they fled New Jupiter, Campbell stared at her in disbelief for several seconds and then wheezed with laughter.

“So Arkady finally found someone who can give as good as she gets?” he asked, shaking his head. “I thought I sensed… something last night, but I wasn’t sure if I was reading too much into things.”

“It can be hard to tell, with Arkady,” Sana agreed. “But honestly, I think the less she talks about it, the more it… matters.”

Eventually, the conversation reached a natural lull, and Sana realised it was almost midnight: they’d been out for almost four hours.

“Campbell…” she began, and then stopped.

“I know, it’s late,” said Campbell, recognising the double-tap on her comm that told her the time. “I guess we should call it a night.”

“Would you like to come back to the ship?” Sana asked him, feeling almost shy. It wasn’t uncommon for Campbell to walk with them back to the Rumor after a night of drinking, usually helping Brian to support Krejjh’s weight while they sang Dwarnian battle hymns with the words in the wrong order. (Or so Brian told her, anyway). But this was a little different. “Or, if you’d rather head home, we can-”

“I don’t have anywhere to be,” said Campbell with a smile. “Lead the way.”

Neither of them said anything much as they walked back to where the Rumor was docked, ducking down various side streets and doubling back on themselves just in case they were being tailed. Sana didn’t sense any immediate danger, but it would just be sloppy not to. She kept her hand within easy reach of the micro-blaster tucked just inside her vest.

The ship was dark when they approached, but Sana doubted that any of the crew was asleep just yet. She used her radio key to unlock the door, and the ramp quietly lowered down to the ground.

The lights on the Rumor were motion-activated, and Sana had always liked the way they gradually turned on when she came back to the ship at night, like they were welcoming her back. In the days when she’d been a crew of one, it had been a comfort.

Sana expected they’d find the crew gathered together in the mess hall, but as she and Campbell walked through the ship’s corridors, there was no sign of anyone. Sana was slightly suspicious – it wasn’t like any of them to go to bed this early. Surely none of them could have known that she’d bring Campbell back to the ship?

“So… When do you think was the last time you actually came on board?” she asked Campbell, to break the silence.

Campbell hummed thoughtfully. “It’s been a good three years. I see you’ve made some upgrades here and there.”

“Yeah, and we even got a new coffee maker, finally,” Sana said drily.

“Oh God, I remember that ancient old thing you used to have. Didn’t Arkady salvage it from a skip on Astraeus?”

“Something like that.” They paused outside the kitchen. “Would you… like a cup?” Sana asked.

Campbell raised one eyebrow and gave her a roguish smile. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that was an invitation, Captain,” he said.

“Let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves, Campbell,” Sana said, turning away so that Campbell wouldn’t see her blush, and leading the way into the kitchen.

“Call me Ignatius,” Campbell said, unexpectedly.

Sana paused in the middle of stretching up to reach the only two (thankfully) clean cups left in the cupboard. It seemed like a small thing, but names carried a lot of meaning, a lot of weight. She’d thought long and hard about the name Sana Tripathi when she’d chosen it, after the uprising. It had represented a new start, new possibilities.

She knew that Campbell, like everyone else in their line of work, had other names that he often went by. But he’d only ever been Campbell to her.

“All right… Ignatius,” she said, trying it out. Campbell smiled at her, warm and fond.

They carried their cups of coffee into the mess hall, and Campbell raised his eyes as he caught sight of the hammock strung up on one side of the room.

“That’s also new. Are those… safety harnesses?”

“Admittedly, not my finest piece of engineering,” Sana admitted. “It was meant to be for morale.”

“Does anyone actually use it?”

Sana felt her face warm again as she considered how best to answer that question. “From time to time.”

“Can I try it out?” Campbell asked playfully.

“Sure, it should hold your weight.”

Campbell set his coffee cup down on the ground by the hammock and cautiously sat down on it, and when it didn’t give way under his weight, swung his legs up and lay down fully.

“This is actually pretty comfortable,” he said in a tone of slight surprise. “The holes are a little unnerving, but it’s a solid hammock.”

“Thanks. I really should take it apart and put the safety harnesses back, but I think the crew like it.”

“I would say ‘Who needs safety harnesses?’, but I know how Krejjh flies,” joked Campbell. “Can it hold two people?”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that was an invitation,” said Sana. She smirked at Campbell, and then added, “Ignatius.”

Campbell’s eyes darkened, and he sat up and reached out a hand. Sana took it, and allowed Campbell to pull her down until – with a little manoeuvring – she was lying next to him on the hammock.

Their bodies were pressed flush against each other, and Sana was sure that Campbell could feel her heart pounding against his chest. Campbell reached up and gently smoothed a piece of stray hair away from her face.

“Is this okay?” he asked in a low rumble. “Are we moving too fast?”

“This is just fine,” Sana replied, and kissed him.

Campbell’s hand came up to gently cup the back of her head as he kissed her back, sending an almost electric thrill through her. Sana extricated her hand from between them and laid it against Campbell’s cheek, kissing him more intently now, inhaling faint notes of aftershave and cologne.

By the time they broke apart, the hammock was swaying gently. Sana smiled at Campbell, feeling a little punch drunk.

“This honestly feels like it’s been… a long time coming,” she said.

“I think it has,” Campbell agreed. “Do you, uh… Should we relocate to somewhere less public?” At such close quarters, Sana could see him blushing slightly.

She thought about it, and the not insignificant chance that one of the crew – who most definitely were not asleep – could walk in on them at any moment.

“Let’s stay here for a little while longer,” she said. “I think it’s only fair that I get to have a turn.”

#TSCOSI #The Strange Case of Starship iris #Sana Tripathi #Sana/Campbell #Arkady Patel #Violet Liu #Arkady/Violet #Brian Jeeter #Krejjh #Brian/Krejjh #the mess hall hammock #strikes again #sad congee for sad spacers #a nod to Rather Be by knightinbrightfeathers #for some more notes see the AO3 version of this fic

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subnova-scion · 5 years

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🟊⟅⸉ IM GONNA TALK ABOUT NOVAVERSE CYM AND WHAT HAPPENS AFTER CAUSE I HAVE THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS LETS GO ⸊⟆🟊

During the final confrontation with White Diamond, not only were the CG’s unable to help Steven, they were turned against him. If the B-team had come in at that moment, they would’ve been turned against him, too. Can you fucking imagine? Seeing your family and friends slowly being possessed? Screaming, howling in agony as they’re turned against you? And you can’t do anything to stop it? And all you’ve got to back you up is your human friend who the person controlling everyone else thinks is disposable? And will not hesitate to try and kill her?

And you’re just a child?

Yeah!!! Steven doesn’t just end up having nightmares about being ripped apart from his gem once this is all over! He also has nightmares about the White Puppets. He had to see them turned! Every adult figure he’s ever trusted and loved had been turned against him by a villain who LITERALLY TRIED TO KILL HIM NOT EVEN MINUTES LATER. LIKE. WHITE DIAMOND DID THAT, KNOWING THAT THE ‘HUMAN CHILD’ PINK WAS ‘HIDING IN’ WOULD PROBABLY, IF NOT UNDOUBTEDLY, DIE.

“I’m tired of this shit, Pink. Time to end it and kill the organic parasite so you can’t run from your problems anymore.”

This is why Steven’s relationship with White Diamond in NOVAverse will be far from canon. He will always be scared of her!! AND THAT’S THE TEA!

As for the attempted murder, Steven barely remembers what happened when it comes to getting his gem removed and seeing his other half. Because when his gem was taken out it was, uh, very bad. Like,, from a gore standpoint. He only remembers vague feelings and images. Both halves experienced the same event, but from their own separate perspectives. One half was bleeding out, though, and your memory kind of takes a back seat when you’re LITERALLY DYING. So Like? He remembers it? But it’s mostly one sided, through his gem half. And that’s why it feels so bizarre when he tries to remember what happened. It feels like an extreme case of out of body dissociation.

Meanwhile, Yellow and Blue and the CG 3 couldn’t remember anything. They didn’t know what was happening, just what they were feeling as White was controlling them. It was severely emotionally and physically painful, and that’s all they knew! So they had no idea what happened, and the crystal gems freaked out when they were freed from White’s control and saw the state of their kid. Because there was still blood!! Everywhere! All over him! And Connie! Since she had to carry Steven over to his other half while he was BLEEDING OUT WITH A HOLE THE SIZE OF HIS FIST IN HIS GUTS.

And these two kids were too relieved and in shock and generally traumatized to answer their questions! They couldn’t even begin to process what exactly had nearly happened to him. Nova had already started to dissociate as soon as he was whole again? Cause his brain was like: ‘Haha gonna just black most of that out and go numb to protect you and keep you functioning through this hellish experience lmao.’

Considering he was almost killed for like the 12th time in his 14 years of life, there are VERY obvious reasons as to why he began falling into a state of dissociation, but what he started dissociating from first is deeply rooted in what happened to him. The first thing he dissociated from was his feelings. See, after his human half sustained serious damage, guess which half has to kick into higher gear to keep him alive and functioning after going through awful trauma?

The gem half. Which is well… Numb. We see that PINK!Steven literally cannot process emotion other than the intense, overwhelmingly negative ones. That sudden outburst, the literal grief and rage of a young god that is sick and tired of everyone wanting his mother to be alive over him. Quartz (That’s what I call Nova’s gem half) didn’t hesitate to strike at all of Nova’s loved ones. He had no attachment. He was doing what he needed to do to protect himself and his other half so they could be whole again. Everyone else was an afterthought.

And that’s how you know Quartz is different. Because the human half, and even as a whole, Steven puts everyone else first. Human Nova (who I call Universe) is literally bleeding out and he’s crying out for his other half to stop because he’s hurting them. But that half is a part of him. And it’s a part he’s been needing to get in touch with for a long time. Considering Steven puts others before himself even to his own detriment, and the reactions of his human half only solidify this fact, if his gem half was anything like that, Steven could have died. He couldn’t afford to strain or distract himself trying to help or protect others. He needed to help himself. Save Steven. That was the objective.

And even as two halves are united again, the gem half is still more or less handling the reigns because of how straight wrecked the human half is at the time. It’s still working to protect himself as a whole. And the first sign of this emotional change is shown in the first thing he says to white after she tried to murder him.

“I am a child. What’s your excuse?”

See, now that he’s been reunited with his other half, he has all the emotions and feelings his human half provides, too. So he’s able to actually lay down some sick burns and common sense without going absolutely apeshit and creating craters with his screams. And this boy didn’t leave quietly with ‘If you let everyone else be whoever they are, maybe you can let yourself be whoever you are, too.’ No. That didn’t quite happen in NOVAverse. Yanno what happened? Yellow and Blue confronted White first, and since she had yet to regain her composure, she was shaken and defensive.

They almost started fighting all over again. They were all terrified and scrambling in fear of the unknown. Until White’s attention was on Steven again. Because, who is this little creature supposed to be if they aren’t Pink??? What the fresh fuck is going on?! Now, we all know PINK!Steven is Mcfuckin Pissed. The gem is back-loaded with thousands of years of emotional turmoil and trauma, most of which isn’t even his own. And this is related to WHY he initially goes off on the diamonds, too.

Because he goes off on them defending Pink Pearl.

Steven had to relieve through so many of his mother’s memories of abuse, and her painful memories of regret regarding what happened to her best friend??? So to actually see Pink Pearl okay and looking like herself again was so important to him. He didn’t just go 'welcome back’ and pat her on the shoulder, HE HUGGED HER AND HELPED HER TO HER FEET. HE WAS IN TEARS. He walked her over to the CGs and said, “ You’re coming with us. ”

LIKE. SHES BEEN SUBJECTED TO MENTAL AND PHYSICAL TORTURE FOR +8,000 YEARS??? GET HER AWAY FROM WHITE. And when White managed to regain her composure and what he was doing caught her attention, she asked him what he could possibly be doing taking her pearl? That’s when Nova went off.

“ She was never yours. She was my mother’s best friend and you took her away and turned her into a puppet and used her as an emotional manipulation tactic to keep my mother under your thumb.

You have kept her like this for thousands of years. It’s time she comes home with us so she can finally start to be herself again. Far away from you.

Die Mad About It.”

Boy put his foot down not just on that, but about his mom and why she left, and why he came here in the first place, that he needed White’s help. And everyone was in such shock and was so overwhelmed and lost because of what just happened that they listened to what he had to say and they did what he told them to! They didn’t know what else to do or how to move forward now that their worlds have been turned upside down!

The night they got back to Earth, the diamonds had to hang around for a while because Steven and Connie are a mess and the CG’s have to take care of them before anything else happens. They have to get them checked out (thanks Dr.Maheswaran.) It was determined they were both in shock, but Connie wasn’t too badly injured. Steven, however, spent the night in the hospital due to blood-loss. He was in enough pain that he had to take it easy and mostly stick to staying in bed. It was fine, as he was majorly exhausted and slept like a rock.

His nature as a demi-gem allowed him to heal faster, but the human half was still seriously damaged. He has to take painkillers and not be too physical for a while. He also has a sicknasty scar around his gem because it was ripped out so that’s Neat. When he uses his powers and his gem glows, you can really see the scarring. It looks something similar to what it looks like when his body comes into contact with destablizers. (He decides to wear bigger t-shirts from now on. He doesn’t want it to be exposed, and he doesn’t want his family to see it)

Then, the next day was the big Bubble Bath. They were all up late, so the healing party happened the following afternoon. Once he was cleared, they checked him out of the hospital, and went straight to the fountain to meet up with the diamonds and finally cure corruption. The water from the fountain helped him heal more, too, so he was feeling better already. He loved meeting all these new friends and was so relieved it was all over. But after a few hours, as it usually is at parties, he just kept talking to so many people and getting distracted and, god, he just couldn’t leave.

Yanno? You just keep trying to leave a party but someone or something keeps sucking you back in. All the people there. How loud they all are. Using his voice becomes exhausting. Thinking becomes exhausting. People talking to him becomes like nails on the chalkboard? Suddenly, everything is so irritating and blurry and painful and so, so loud he feels like he’s going crazy. And when he finally has a quiet moment to himself to be mindful of his own state he’s like, “Oh. I’m having an anxiety attack in slow motion and probably experiencing sensory overload. Cool.”

He’s so mentally overwhelmed and burnt out that he just felt himself having a meltdown at ¼th the speed and knew it would speed up or blow up if he didn’t leave. They had to take him home and he just went to bed. From that day on, for another week or two, Steven is under the constant watch of the Crystal Gems and doted on. He didn’t particularly mind some affection, because he was just so relieved to be home. To be safe. To be alive. Understandably, his family and friends were worried, of course they were. How could they not be, with the state he was in after that fight?

He looked like a dead boy walking, clothes and limbs absolutely bloody. They hadn’t the slightest clue what happened after White Diamond took control of them, and they could only look to Steven for answers. Steven always told them he doesn’t really remember what happened, which is only partially true, and they say that since then, he hasn’t seemed like himself. They say that in the aftermath, that he acted strange and cold, that now he seems ‘far away’ and is too quiet.

While that was true, it was only the case at a certain point because Steven found it harder and harder to be around them when they looked at him like he could die at any second and talked to him like they want to scrape the inside of his skull with a spoon.

See, Nova is struggling with his emotions a lot more now, in terms of emotional detachment and his literal demi-god power showing through in his personality a bit more? He was BORN a fusion, but reflected his human half more than the gem half for so long because he wasn’t in touch with gem stuff for the first 10 years of this life.

This is why he couldn’t use his powers for a long time. But NOW that he’s come so far and has seen his gem half for what it really is, seen himself for who he really is, it’s changed the cognition of the human half. So now that they're whole, the gem half and all the Diamond Powers are like, ‘Hello, I am here now. I am also you.’

And both halves are struggling to balance the whole self out again. This is why his Pink Power™ is more obvious from this point onward. It’s the “Light of his gem shining through”, as White Diamond put it. Now, Steven himself doesn’t know this, so he can’t put his finger on why it’s so hard to talk, why he feels distant, not only from his family, but his own feelings.

He needs time alone to work through them, to try and understand what exactly happened, and why he’s feeling so odd. At times, he feels simply… indifferent to everything, some kind of numb. But there is another uncommon feeling that frightens him more; Anger, it rises within him frequently, so much so that he almost feels bad about it when it does. He was never one to feel this way so easily before.

Not to say he doesn’t have things to be angry about, to be emotional about. He’s angry because wasn’t even allowed to leave the house by himself for a whole week. He hadn’t seen Connie since they got back, and it seems that he could never get enough time with his father, the only other person who being around would make it easier to breathe. Every conversation with the gems eventually leads to being about what’s wrong, the questions Steven couldn’t answer, that he doesn’t want to answer. It’s hard to express this when they’re each being their own ways of overbearing about his well-being, and his anxiety is off the charts.

The question of the Diamonds and what they were going to do, how they were going to continue, looms over him. It’s such a source of his stress that he has as much trouble falling asleep as he does staying asleep the whole night through. He has to know what’s happening. What they’re doing. He couldn’t just leave them be and expect things to not go back to how they were before. At times, he feels like he has to go back to Homeworld, but how could he?

Especially if he told his family what happened to him? Steven knew that if he did, that they wouldn’t let him, and who knows what else would happen. Truthfully, he’s afraid they wouldn’t see or treat him the same anymore. He feels like he has to be okay as soon as possible so he can do what he feels needs to be done, but the longer this goes on the more he feels like he’s having a meltdown in slow motion.

The peace he was hoping to have after going through such a harrowing time is yet again out of his reach… and it’s getting harder and harder to swallow his slowly boiling frustrations.

#🟊⟅⸉ᴏᴏᴄ⸊⟆🟊

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solunova · 5 years

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hey uh ib is... como se dice... a Fuck. like as someone who is still trying to recover psychologically after graduating and getting my diploma. like i was Smart Good At School and hung out with Smart Good At School and we were all dying the entire time. you may have some issues but like. shit's fucked man

(Another Anonymous said: Hey don’t stress yourself too much with ib stuff, they suck now and are so freaking stressful but they are definitely steps that will help you down the road (coming from someone who definitely credits all the ia and shit I had to write to helping me rewrite a 10 page college paper 3 days before it’s due and get an a on it) these things have their place in you academic journey (also don’t stress the ioc’s too much you have that knowledge in your brain you can do it!))

i guess before i start: thank you two. person 1 for validation in my pain and 2 for encouragement that ill be okay and that it isnt all for naught. i appreciate both of yall!

but its my birthday at 1:40 am and im fucking SAD cause im up trying to write my entire bio ia due friday after some Complications came up so this is gonna be a mostly negative retrospective of my last two years and the circumstances that ive lived in due to the ib

i refuse to put this under a cut yall scroll past word walls anyways

so heres my hot and absolutely original take: i recognize that ib is extremely beneficial in certain regards. i know from everyone who took it telling me that its good for college experience and all that kind of stuff, both on a knowledge/content level and on, as person 2 describes, an “i cant get off my ass to write this paper in time” level and being able to compensate for that. i agree with that! I am extremely grateful for an increased class difficulty, especially in the fields where i knew what was happening already and spent classes bored until ib. and like! ib english is the first goddamn time ive EVER talked about the evils of imperialism and colonialism in an academic setting. that shit is vital to our future and yet no normal class talks about it!!! its terrible! and ib history is the first time ive ever enjoyed a history class and gotten even a margin of a good feeling out of it. like there are some really good parts of ib that ive written every damn college entry essay ive gotten on. i Know.

but like okay lets start with the fact that going into this that they (as in all ib teachers) were like “oh itll break you out of procrastination! itll teach you to constantly be studying!!! its what you need for college!!!!!” when it has done all of jack and shit to help us achieve that. its just kind of put us in the lions den and let us scramble at the walls for a foothold to get out or at least survive, maimed and depraved. if it sees us stopping to catch our breath, it shoots at our feet. the ibo extorts our misery to feed their mirth

lets also acknowledge that dumb fucks who take full ib, or even worse, those taking pseudo full ib (ie all classes but no diploma cause their extended essay busted and they gave up ie me) mostly take it due to extreme pressure, be it from their schools, their family, or their own psyche, saying they arent good enough if they dont take the highest offered classes, or even more that if they arent doing well in those classes its a product of their own shortcomings and then spend most of the rest of the time in ib degrading themselves because no matter how much time they put in they cant be the best and all that fun stuff. ib kids are put on a sort of pedestal by the school but then left on their own.

i, of course, see this as a much greater academic institution integrated mindset that needs to be addressed and challenged, but to force it on kids who have to not only go through with it for the next four years, but also because its targeted at these kids that are higher achieving “gifted and talented” fucking whatever, most likely the rest of their lives?

its straight up psychologically damaging to give such a rigorous course load and no help for the effects and self esteem issues from it, no help for the people who dont know how to give up and instead run themselves in the fucking dirt and strain themselves to the edges of their goddamn sanity, spending what little time is left in their adolescence treating themselves like shit

idealistically, ib is wonderful. i think it carries out some of its best traits (integrating global thinking, allowing a more freeform discussion of many things, etc), but i also recognize how absolutely full of shit it is in many corners (regarding encouraging service, intellectual honesty, whatever else), one, and that a lot of people are just.. not up to the task. they may have the ability intellectually, but not mentally. i firmly believe that anyone can do anything if they set their minds to it but i have become the victim of my own philosophy because that came at the expense of my well-being.

and the fact that when i tried to tell my coordinator this she a) did not let me just NOT do the ee despite how strained i was(which i didnt end up doing, lick my whole dick mrs kurtz) and stole my summer from me because between being depressed as hell at gsp i was a nervous wreck about what they could do to me or how i was going to accomplish anything that i needed to, and that i havent had a proper break from school in three straight years, that im still running on empty essentially and b) that when i told the other ib coordinator, 4 months later, theres not a souls chance in hell that i was gonna fucking do it, that she lectured me and made me cry in class about how “you cant see the forest for the trees” “thisll help you later in life” “youre throwing away jobs” all that fun stuff like

its evil

the lack of care that often goes into it

the extreme magnitude of work that, sure, is feasibly possible for a 16-18 year old to do, but here theyre expected to

the fact that the classes fall in a time where gpa is so absolutely vital to colleges and scholarships (and given that its these ib kids’ personality and intellectual dispositions, even more so - both in esteem and necessity)

the fact that so many of the classes and so much of the coursework is empty, ultimately

its kind of a bad system

not even to MENTION the egotistical complexes, both inwardly as addressed and outwardly as in being the most godawful kind of people that manifests in these people that think theyre gods gift to the world cause they took ib and “if you spend time bitching about ib you deserve to fail because that was time you could have spent working” like you sound like the worst kind of person and i dont fucking care. theres a girl in my classes who is so upset every time someone doesnt listen to her because she thinks everything she has to say is the goddamn gospel and ib really attracts these kinds of people and its the WORST

#this isnt even organized i dont fucking care i hhhhhate ib #like im glad i took it to some extent and i think this is certainly a two year span that will affect me for the rest of my life #but the psychological scars are so deep in my grey matter that i cry #every time i think about them because my worldview has gotten #so warped that i dont think i can really ever recover my self esteem #im TERRIFIED my college years are gonna be a replica of ib #like yknow?#anyways #long post #ib #yknow i was vaguing someone specific but it applies to like 5 people in that same class #Anonymous

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jaremish · 6 years

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I Want Him Gone - Part 2

Pairing: Sam x teen!reader, Dean x teen!Reader (both plantonic)

Warnings: Blood, lots of panic, torture, angst

Word Count: 1740

Summary: You were kidnapped at the age of 14, having your parents killed right in front of you by a demon. Tortured almost daily for two years, you luckily escape only to run into the Winchesters. They quickly help you, not only physically but also mentally, taking you in almost as a little sister. Though there’s something crawling under your skin… revenge.

A/N: Okay I know, I just posted the first part yesterday, but I couldn’t hold myself.. The next update will be some time later this week. Happy reading y’all!

Part 1 | Series Matserlist | Taglist (or send an ask)

You were in the state between being asleep and being awake. Not wanting to wake up, you shifted to get into a more comfortable position only to be meet with pain spreading from your left leg. With a small whimper your eyes shoot up looking around the room.

You were left confused and panicked, not knowing where you were or what to do. Maybe this was another set of illusions that the demon had set up. It was one of the first things he did to torture you, making you believe you were with your parents only for them to be killed constantly, breaking you down more and more.

Feeling terrified of what's coming next you shot out of the bed, not caring for the pain and making your way towards the corner. It was something you learned early, having your back free always hurt you. This way you had a clear vision on what was going on in front of you.

Pulling your legs up towards you chest and wrapping your arms around them was the next thing you did. Your leg was bulting, making itself known. The frustration and fear of not knowing what was going on forced fresh tears down your cheeks.

You stayed in the corner, feeling alert and focused for about an hour before you put your head down to rest against your knees. The black t-shirt you had on was not yours. It was really big on you, but it was still warmer than what you usually wore. It felt nice against your skin, it didn’t itch at all.

You kept staring down at the t-shirt, almost admiring it. Too lost in your thoughts about the shirt you didn’t notice the door out of the room open.

“Y/N?” A soft voice said from the door.

The sound made you jump and you turned your head towards the voice. Your whole body was tense until you saw who it was. Sam. The memories from how you literally ran into him, and him bringing you here made it into your head.

Sam spotted you in the corner of the room, shaking. He made his way towards you slowly, not wanting to startle you. When he was close enough he stopped and sat down in front of you.

“You okay?” Sam said.

You didn’t answer. You just kept staring at him, not trusting him at all. Your body was tense, ready in case he attacked. Maybe he worked for the demon? Maybe this was their new way of torturing you.

Leaving the door open for you to have a sense of hope and freedom only to stab you in the back when you started to trust them. But Sam looked like he cared. He didn’t have the same sick smile on his face like the others had…

“Can you tell me what happened?” Sam asked, still trying to make you say something. Quickly giving up on the heavy questions he asked something simple.

“Are you hungry?” He smiled after asking this. He had this calming effect about himself. A little sigh left his lips and he stood up.

“Well you must be, you’ve been sleeping for days kiddo. I’m gonna come back with some food, okay?”

With that he left the room. He came back after a few minutes with a tray in his hands. You had not moved from your spot at the corner. Sam knew you wouldn’t move up to the bed if he asked you, so he sat down in front of you again on the floor.

He put the tray down in between you both. On the tray was a plate with bacon, eggs and some pancakes. There was also a glass of water, a fork and a knife on the tray as well. He made a motion with his hands as if he wanted you to do something.

You shook your head at him, not wanting to eat the food he came with. For all you knew he could have poisoned it. Sam was pretty sure you wouldn’t eat at first glance, so he brought his own fork with him. He took a bite out of the eggs, showing you that it was okay to eat.

You watched him take a bite out of the bacon and the pancakes too before he reached for your fork and gave it to you. Your hand wrapped around the fork carefully. You looked down at the tray and took a small bite out of the eggs. This made Sam smile a little and he incurred you to eat some more.

You avoided the bacon, not liking how the smell reminded you a little of burnt flesh. You ate really slow, always watching Sam’s every move. There was a lot left on the plate when you decided that you were done with it.

You reached for the water, craving the feeling of the cool liquid. Your throat had been pretty sore ever since you woke up. You emptied the glass quickly and put it back on the tray, looking up at Sam.

“You know, you don’t have to sit in the corner. You have a pretty comfy bed in here.” He said after a while.

You made no movement as he scooted the tray away and reached over to the bed. He took the blanket and a pillow and put it next to where you sat.

“At least put this around you, it can be pretty cold on the floor.”

Sam then stood up with the tray to leave the room. He looked back from the door and smiled a little at you before he walked out.

You were all wrapped up in the blanket, ready to take a small nap when you heard voices. Straining your ears to hear what they said you quickly knew it was Sam and Dean talking in hushed tones.

“Did you test her? Was she clear?” The voice belonged to Dean.

“Yeah Dean. She held the silver fork and drank the holy water and nothing. She’s just a small terrified girl.” Sam answered back with a sigh.

“Do you know what happened? Did she talk to you?”

Sam sighed again and you assumed he shook his head or something before he answered.

“No, she’s not talking. She looks so scared, I’m worried something really bad happened to her.”

Their voices started to disappear. They were moving away from the room you were in. Still being tired you gave in and fell asleep on the cold, hard floor.

“Hmm, Y/N, tell me… for how long have you been here?” The demon said.

You were sitting in your usual chair, wrists and ankles bound by leather straps. Your hair and your clothes was sticking to your face and body. Sweat tickled your skin as it slowly ran down your limbs, almost as if it was teasing you.

“Screw you.” Was all you said.

The demon hummed as he came closer to you. He was holding something in his hand that blinded you as it came in contact with the light.

“I believe that’s the wrong answer..” He said.

The thing in his hand turned out to be a scalpel. He ran it down your arm, not putting any pressure, just making sure you knew who was the boss here.

“Let’s try that again, how long have you been here?”

“Go to hell!” You screamed at his face.

The scalpel was pressed against your arm, running down in a long horizontal line, blood seeping out of your arm. Your screams could be heard for miles away. You trashed around, trying to get away from the scalpel and the pain it was causing you.

“For how long have you been here?” He said again in a calm voice.

“One day I’m going to kill you, you better watch out.” You said through gritted teeth.

He laughed. He actually laughed. Then he rammed the scalpel in your stomach. You screamed, coughing out blood. He continued to cut you though your screaming. All you could see was blood everywhere, pouring out of you stomach and all you could do was lay there and scream, wishing you were somewhere else. You felt as if you were on the blink of death when he stopped and leaned down next to your ear.

“I do hope you remember how you should speak to me from now on. A lil tip is to never speak when you don’t have the word as well.” He whispered in your ear.

“I hope I teached you a lesson.” Was the last thing he said as he rammed the scalpel through your leg.

You woke up to your own screaming. Tears running down your cheeks as the memory flooded through your brain. You could almost feel the pain he inflicted on you that day. The door slammed open, making you scream even more.

“Hey, hey, hey, you okay?” Sam said as he ran to your trembling form on the floor.

You were shaking, panic running through your body. Trying to breathe was another challenge seeing as if there were no oxygen left in the room. You started to hyperventilate, feeling even more panicked because you couldn’t breathe. Your heart beat fast and your head started to spin.

Sam was by your side in an instant, picking you up from the cold floor you were laying on. He sat on the bed with your back plastered to his chest.

“You gotta calm down Y/N. Try to match your heart beats to my own. Feel this?” He said as he placed your hand on the sheet. “This is real, you’re here, nothing’s gonna hurt you.”

He continued to give you instructions on how to breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth, taking deep breaths with you. It was not long before you started to calm down. You still trembled in his arms, not letting go of the memory.

“Shh, just breathe. It’ll be okay. I’m here, nothing bad is going to happen to you.” Sam said camly.

Not long after that you start to relax, feeling his heartbeat was calming you down due to you having something else to focus on. Sam draped the blanket over you and continued to encourage you to take deep breaths. After a while of just breathing you started to fall asleep, leaning against Sam. 5 minutes later and you were out like a light.

Masterlist | Part 3 (coming soon)

Tagging

@miraxo-xo-supernatrual @bellero @chennyetomlinson @sammywiththegoodhair @im-forever-a-fangirl @whocares006 @sushisecor @spectaculicious @oliolioxiclean @mrsmichaelclifford1 @ellaorelizabeth @iliketowrite02

#my fanfiction #sam x reader #sam x teen!reader #sam winchester fanfiction #dean x reader #dean x teen!reader #dean winchester fanfiction #the winchesters fanfiction #sam x you x dean #supernatural fanfiction #spn fanfic #IWHG #I want him gone #reader insert #teen!reader #part 2

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muslimsonic · 6 years

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ADHD: Executive Dysfunction

Alright, so I’ve been seeing a lot of stuff about how people struggle with understanding what ADHD is, how it operates, and how it differs from the experiences of the middle 50% [25%-75%] considered the average. And I didn’t research ADHD for 9 hours straight not to dump all of this here.

Note: I have ADHD, I’ve researched this, but I am not a medical professional blah blah blah ok now onto the fun interesting stuff!!!!

I put this under a cut bc its,,,, longish.

What is executive functioning?

Executive functioning is what carries you from day to day tasks. It’s like the constantly active personal assistant in the back of your head. Let’s call them Effie. Effie constantly makes lists and breaks down tasks for you! I don’t mean large projects, I mean the simple stuff!

Like doing your laundry.

If you have ADHD, or anything with executive dysfunction as an issue, then you probably already know that the simple stuff hardly ever feels simple.

Doing your laundry requires many motions, most of which you omit in listing what you must do to complete this task.

Someone with executive functions in working order, probably

1. Take the laundry basket/bin/thing to the washing machine

2. Put the laundry in the washing machine

3. Put the detergent in the machine

4. Turn on the machine

5. When it is ready, put the clothes in the dryer

6. Collect the clothes when finished

7. Take them back to your room

8. Fold and put away

Tada! All done. There are quite a few steps omitted that you would consider givens. However, try and apply this precise list to someone with executive dysfunction, and you will most likely not have the same success, because of the number of places where steps conflict, being thrown out in favor of what is done immediately. Here’s a small idea of how many cracks are in this plan, even at step one:

1. Take the laundry basket/bin/thing to the washing machine

When?> I’ll do it after I finish what I’m doing > Oh no I just remembered something else > What did I forget to do? > Oh no now I have no clothes for work/school/whatever > MISSION FAILED

When?> Someone else is using the washing machine now, i’ll do it later > What did I forget to do? > Oh no now I have no clothes :( > MISSION FAILED

Why? > I have enough clothes right now, I’ll be fine > Oh no I ran out of clean socks + underwear > MISSION FAILED

What?> There’s no detergent so I can’t do this > (at the grocery store) I think i have everything! > Oh no i forgot detergent > I have no clean clothes :( > MISSION FAILED

When?> I have too much free time so I’ll do it after I take care of this other thing that’s equally important > Oh no I forgot to do my laundry I don’t have anything to wear > MISSION FAILED

In what order? > There’s too much to do and they are all registered in my head as permanently equal priority so I have to do them all at the same time, but I can’t do them all at the same time, so I physically am unable to proceed until this loop/error is resolved.

What extra steps are involved?> Huh i know i have to take my laundry to the washing machine, but there’s also stuff in the washing machine area/on the way there that needs to be moved in order to do it, but I haven’t thought of that, instead seeing metaphorically an indistinct looming mass of extra equal priority work around taking my laundry to the washing machine > I don’t do it > MISSION FAILED

And that’s only a few of the cracks in step one.

See the problem?

Let’s take a closer look at how deep it goes. Do you know how much you rely on executive functioning in your day to day life? Yes? No? How did you get out of bed this morning? How did you open your eyes? Everything you do, even running away from something chasing you, is dependent on executive functioning. Memory. Recall. Starting anything, and I mean anything. Breaking down what needs to be done. You’re so used to it, you see a lot of the steps as givens not needed to be stated. When do you do this? What priority level is this? Every success you’ve had in your life, you would not have had without your executive functioning.

It’s the messenger, sending signals from the hub, recall this, you have to do this, this task is more important than this, this is what you’re going to do. It translates thought into action, idea into concept into reality. It’s the Director, streamlining things, going into crisis management when you make a major mistake or fail to do something, or have something due, or or or. Granted, executive functions aren’t the be all end all of human success, but they are to you as a foundation is to a building.

Scary to think what would happen if it just

stopped.

You could think all you want, of course. You need to do this. You want to do that. You scream and rail and fight against a prison of your own unresponsive limbs.

There’s nothing physically wrong with your limbs. They are in perfect working order. Or at least as working as they had been before. There’s no reason for you to feel like this. You feel like your brain is setting itself on fire in its attempts to send it messages to get a response any kind of fucking response. You feel hopeless. You gain no mental traction. You gain nothing but your own hatred and frustration and gain the same of others too.

Because they think you’re faking it. That you just don’t want to do it hard enough. That you just need to apply yourself.

The thing is, you’ve been trying. Your mind is a car in a swamp, uselessly running its wheels to no avail, sinking deeper and deeper into the muck. You are straining as hard as you possibly can. There’s no more gas in the tank. You have nothing left to give.

And you have nothing to show for it.

In this hell, you’ve accomplished nothing. You’ve succeeded at nothing. Nothing you do, nothing you say, and nothing you want can ever happen in this moment.

You almost feel like dying. But you can’t. You can’t, not because of will to live, not because of hope, and not because of love, but because you cannot get your limbs to remember what motion is, your brain to remember the past, and your heart to remember restraint. Frustration, anger, hatred, all of the ugliest emotions the soul has to offer spill over. You feel like you can never be happy again. That you’ve never felt happy before. That this awful feeling crawling into the crevices of your lungs and trachea and curling its way around your stomach and spleen is what you will feel like for the rest of your life.

And then you forget. You forget everything that got you to that point. the wave recedes. you feel nothing. you remember only blurs of what occurred at best. only to experience the same fucking thing again, and again, and again and its always as raw and drowning as the first time you felt it, you never grow used to it, and it will never stop, it will never cease, and no one believes you when you say you are trying. You are a soul inside a vessel that doesn’t want to be yours.

anyways! while this may seem like an extreme, the last few paragraphs are a pretty solid descriptor of how living with executive dysfunction feels like! this is also a solid reason why people with ADHD are more likely to have anxiety and depression! the same thing is characteristic of people with disorders that have executive dysfunction as a symptom!

so TL;DR: Executive Dysfunction is not the same as laziness; it is a fundamental difference in the brain structure and wiring or a deficiency in neurotransmitter production.

speaking of that, moving onto the physiological side of executive dysfunction! Yes! There’s actually a physiological side to ADHD! Pretty sure that’s a characteristic of all brain disorders illnesses and the like but people still say its fake! :D

ok i’m getting tired so heres the rundown:

lower catecholamine levels: catecholamine is a class of neurotransmitter that includes fun stuff like

Dopamine: the motivation sauce

Seratonin: Happy Happy Happy

Adrenaline: you put this in epipens. fight or flight

Noradrenaline: also fight or flight. includes attention as well. at higher levels, anxiety. Thanks, God.

Its bad. bc the body’s natural reward system (dopamine) isn’t at normal levels, the nice little feel good kick after you make your bed or brush your teeth?? nope!!!!!!! Thus there is little internal motivation to do anything. WOW!!! How did adhd get passed down in the gene pool???? is it recessive?? bc im rly at a loss. idk someone with a medical degree in brain science dm me abt it. I rly need to understand.

Also the frontal lobe, y’know the thing controlling judgment, morals, impulses, emotions, all of that fun stuff???? it’s usually behind in development, typically evening out mid to late twenties, but its still,,,,, not Great. Wow!!

White matter abnormalities are apparently a thing too?? White matter is the brains messaging system so when that’s messed up I’m pretty sure thats not a good thing.

anyways, i’m tired now, its been 2 hrs since i’ve started writing this and I have a metric ton of things that I needed to start but didn’t, so

TL;DR: ADHD (and by further extent, executive dysfunction)has a basis in science and has physiological stuff associated with it that (i think since MRIs aren’t being used to diagnose adhd) is just being studied recently, and uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh google exists use it b4 getting into arguments abt the existence of disorders and such. plz. im begging you.

#actuallyadhd #executive functioning #executive dysfunction #adhd #ramadan says things

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xxx-mundiemudsnapper-xxx · 3 years

Text

think im gonna be slowly losing my mind over the coming weeks and venting in my personal channels in discord isnt helping like it used to so im sorry but i gotta bitch here

ive been having burnout really bad lately. i dont want to play anything in my steam library which sucks because i just. i want to play scream fortress but i dont really have the mental energy anymore for actually playing tf2. i dont feel like opening any roblox games i like. i dont feel like reinstalling DE or PD2 on my other hard drive to play those.

theres nothing i want to watch on youtube. all the music ive been listening to is getting worn out. literally i dont know what to do or talk about to entertain myself. and now on top of that i cant go anywhere or do anything for eight weeks because my mom broke her hand. eight. fucking. weeks. where im now stuck in this fucking house for 24/7 and i have to constantly be at her beck and call more often than i already have to be.

i cant go out to practice driving with my dad. i JUST got my permit back like 2 weeks ago (original one was expired.) at least one of us has to be here all the time. and its going to be me. every. single. time.

im going to have to have the burden of EVERY FUCKING HOUSEHOLD thing now. im probably not gonna get helped by my dad bc hes literally constantly at work (not his fault, ik hes busy but it just blows im not gonna get help when i really need it.)

compounding w/this is that i moderate a relatively good sized discord and a handful of newer members are really annoying me (nobody following me if ur in there ofc but like Yeah) and im very glad we were able to get 2 more mods but i had to deal with something serious and it really strained me even though i was like. barely that involved with it.

plus we keep having random incidental shit happen when im the only moderator online. im incredibly incredibly grateful for the two newer mods who have been able to handle some more recent things while ive been desperately trying to have any semblance of an actual life but like. im not fucking joking when i say i shouldnt have to explain why school shootings and child soldiers arent funny or acceptable for an original character. god people like this piss me off so much esp when theyre like “sorry i cant tell whats inapprorpiate an whats not :(((((((((” when its pretty clear we dont allow stuff along those lines in our rules like. come on. dont joke about that shit. dont post borderline fetishy shit in a server with like 14 year olds in it.

oh and forget all that, i cant fucking enjoy time i have off after doing relatively large amounts of homework because: - everything opens sunday, is due next sunday - class discussion boards never have posts until like saturday/sunday night so im stuck with that hovering over my head all weekend bc nobody else fucking bothers to do the assignments until the last minute - one teacher posts her stuff and like makes 3 announcements about it on FRIDAY AFTERNOONS for whatever reason

with that like i said i literally feel like i cant catch a break from schoolwork because im being harassed by it when i should be able to sit back and relax and not have to worry about it

im trying really hard not to just sit here and break down and cry but im really fucking sick of all of this. im not going to be able to get supplies or anything to make anything until mid december. i have almost no stuffing and the only kind i can reliably get online comes in really small bags.

all i want to do is go to like. joannes. target. maybe the mall or something. im going fucking insane in this house sitting here spiralling into depression really badly and any hope i had to stave that shit off just got thrown in the trash like my moms pajama pants she tripped on.

im fucking tired of it. im fucking tired of being under constant mounting pressure for no fucking reason. i already have my own diabetes bullshit to deal with, i DONT need more fucking stress on top of it but apparently im gods fucking laughing stock or whatever because each day feels like it just gets worse

#mecha speaks #vent #please for the love of god help me #i apologize but i really dont have the spoons to trigger tag this so read at your own risk #no im not tagging for length either #i need someone else to hear this bullshit im living through right now #i need help. something. literally anything.#just someone else to like. try comforting me because i dont want to keep stressing everyone else out

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panticwritten · 6 years

Text

Pearl-Handled Shotgun: Chapter One

Yeah. I have no posting schedule for this haha. We’ll just see how it goes.

Prologue

Word count: 2978

TW:

Emotional warfare (of the controlling parent kind)

Hardcore dissociation

Reference to police brutality

Alyssa

“You’re lucky we could keep it out of the newspapers.”

Alyssa doesn’t look at her father, drumming her nails against the arm of the chair. Her mom watches from a chair behind him, her disapproval clear in the curve of her brow, the thin line of her mouth. The teen turns her head so she doesn’t have to see either of them.

“That man could have pressed charges. Do you think he would have gone after your little friends?” She bristles at the sneer in his voice, but she keeps her mouth shut. “You have a promising future ahead of you, I won’t stand by and watch you throw that away.”

She nods idly, the bare minimum of what he wants from her.

“I don’t know where this is coming from, your lashing out. Your brother never did anything like this.”

Ah, there it is. Calim, the perfect son. The good one. The easy one.

“He just never got caught,” she mutters.

“What was that?”

She looks up, at the familiar anger in her father’s eyes. He cocks an eyebrow up, expectant. She sighs and shakes her head. “Nothing. I’m sorry.”

He stares at her, his gaze hard, before returning to pacing to and fro in front of the fireplace. “What else have you been doing behind our backs? It isn’t safe, and it certainly isn’t acceptable.”

“Last night was an accident,” Alyssa says before she can hold the words back. “We took a wrong turn.”

He stills, burning eyes back on her. “You shouldn’t have been out at all last night!”

“I already apologized for that.”

“You can’t really think a petty ‘sorry’ will make up for breaking our trust? For sneaking out, so you could—what? Run around the city with a group of delinquents?”

She straightens up, scrabbling to hold onto her unruffled air. “Delinquents?”

“They’re a bad influence.”

“They are not!” Shoulders squared, Alyssa’s practiced placidity ruptures at his ‘holier than thou’ stance. “Stephanie and Jared are good friends, and they don’t treat me like a glass doll or a- a- a piece of advertising!”

“Alyssa, dear, please don’t yell,” her mom warns, her voice soft. It diffuses the immediate tension in the air. Her father says nothing. The coolness in his eyes, however, tells her the damage has already been done. Alyssa clears her throat and continues with more restraint.

“I apologize, sincerely, for what happened. I should have been honest with you.” She pauses, heartened when her father jerks his head in a nod. “It wasn’t the first time I left without permission, and it was unfair of me keep you in the dark.”

“How many times?”

“What?”

“How many times have you snuck out?” he asks. His deceptively level voice spreads anxiety through her chest, thick and sticky in her throat. She swallows it down and makes a mental tally.

“Twelve?” She offers. It’s not counting the days she used shopping trips as cover for driving the roads on the eastern edges of Portland with her friends, but she doesn’t tell him that.

He considers this thoughtfully, as if deciding whether he’ll have honey or jam on his toast. Alyssa sees it in his eyes when he comes to a conclusion, one fist coming down on his open palm.

“Then we’ll discuss this again in twelve weeks.”

Her heart constricts in her chest, driving her to her feet. She manages to keep her mouth shut, but that’s not enough. It’s never enough. He raises a brow, unimpressed, and starts for the family room door.

“You won’t leave the manor unattended until then. You have ten minutes to tell your friends before I collect your devices.” He pauses at the door, looking back with a painfully detached expression. “Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir,” she says automatically, unable to suppress the reflex.

The door closes behind him, with hardly a whisper. She stares unseeing at the polished surface, almost wishing he had slammed it. She lowers herself back into the chair, wiping the back of a hand over her eyes before the pinch behind them can turn into tears.

If he can keep ahold of his temper, so can she.

“It could have been worse.” Alyssa jolts violently when her mom speaks. She had almost forgotten she was here.

“I know.” She doesn’t look over, dragging her phone out of her pocket. Steph and Jared will lose their minds if she just disappears for three months, especially after her father left them in jail for the night.

“You could have been killed,” she continues, voice low. Alyssa freezes, her fingers hovering over the screen. “ Just because we are who we are doesn’t mean it’s safe to get into trouble. An officer won’t think twice before they pull that trigger.”

Alyssa nods, looking up. Without her father here as a distraction, she now sees what she didn’t before in her mom’s furrowed brow, pressed lips. Fear, not disappointment. Regret pangs in her chest. “I know, mom. I swear we weren’t trying to do anything illegal.”

“That doesn’t matter.” She rises from her chair, full of grace as always, and offers her daughter a strained smile. “You need to be careful. Smarter. I’ll try to talk your father down, but I do agree that you need time to think about what happened last night.”

She nods again, and her mom starts for the door.

“I’m sorry for scaring you.”

She doesn’t answer, closing the door silently behind her. Alyssa sighs, sinking deeper into the back of the chair, and pulls up a group chat.

A<-- Hey.

A<-- I am SO sorry about my father, I can’t believe he just left you there.

A<-- I hope you both are okay. At the very least, that you’re home safe.

A<-- I can’t leave the house on my own for a few months, and he’ll be back for my phone any minute now.

She watches the screen with bated breath. After a moment, both of their icons appear beside the messages. Before she can register her relief, Steph responds.

S--> hey!

S--> i was starting to rly worry

S--> mom picked us up right after u left

A<-- Oh, thank god.

J--> a few months

J--> what the hell

J--> my dad took my keys but like

J--> just for a two weeks

S--> im grounded for a month :(

A<-- We’ve talked about my parents before. Are you really surprised?

J--> nah i guess not

J--> but thats hella rough

J--> someone needs to take some parenting classes

S--> im sorry aly

J--> how to be a good dad and not alienate your children or whatever

J--> oh shit yeah we kinda did get you in trouble huh

A<-- It’s not your fault. My mom said she’ll try to change his mind, but I doubt that will do much good.

A<-- Besides, you both got in trouble, too. It’s as much my fault as it is yours.

J--> no man dont say that

J--> youd never been camping thats a fucking crime

J--> i mean shooting at teenagers for pitching a damn tent should be a crime but thats a whole other thing

S--> jj

S--> not funny

A<-- He’s right, though.

J--> hell yeah drinking down this validation

J--> glug glug motherfucker

S--> stop

S--> ur ok tho?

S--> like should we worry?

Her phone slips through her fingers, pulled away by nimble hands, before she can answer. She hadn’t noticed her father come back in, and he leaves again without otherwise acknowledging her. She watches him go without a word.

Arguing more would make it worse. She’s lucky to have gotten ten minutes.

Now that she’s alone with nothing to do, she hefts herself upright. She stares at the embers glowing in the fireplace, considering what to do for the rest of the day. She has schoolwork due on Monday. She needs to decide within the month between Oxford—her father’s alma mater—or the local university her friends already enrolled in.

PSU sounds more fun. She wouldn’t like to think of the repercussions that may come out of that decision, though. Her parents don’t even know she applied.

She shakes her head and strides out of the room. Her feet take her along the familiar path upstairs to her study while she broods about three months without the promise of a night out on the town or a day flying along back roads in Jared’s convertible. By the time the bars are lifted, she’ll have graduated.

And she’ll have a month with them before her inevitable shipment off to Oxford.

She slams the door much harder than intended at the thought. She’s visited the campus a few times, walked through the city, and something about it leaves her uneasy. It’s beautiful, certainly, but it feels wrong.

She leans back against the door with a sigh, peering at the stack of books on her desk. The last thing she needs is for her grades to slip. She’s on thin ice as it is.

Her gaze drifts to the shelves lining the back of the room. They hold the books she’s sequestered from the library, or those that have been gifted to her.

She crosses to the closest shelf, running a finger along the books’ spines. Many of them, she still hasn’t read. She hasn’t had time to read since her parents began taking her to functions and benefits.

She dips a finger over the lip of the first in a series of old tomes wrapped in leather, one of her mom’s gifts to her this past Christmas, and drags it out. The first seems more weathered than the rest, the cover dull and rough rather than polished. She skimmed the first few pages when she first got the books, and she know there must have been effort put into it. The whole series is handwritten.

It’s as good as anything else.

She takes the book to her desk, promising herself that she’ll only read for a while. She has to get some work done before dinner, after all.

*****

“Alyssa? Are you in there?”

Alyssa jumps at the crackle of the intercom, heart racing and unseeing eyes leaving the yellowed pages of the book. It takes a few seconds to orient herself, remembering where she is. When she does, she recoils at the headache pounding behind her eyes, the roiling tension in her stomach.

She glances back down at the book to find it open near the middle. She can’t remember reading more than the first few pages—it was written as a personal diary of a slave girl named Brietta. She wrote in a neat script about mundane chores and city life, but she can’t remember the details of the anecdotes. She closes her eyes to try and remember.

Her stomach turns over when she catches a wisp of it, but it doesn’t stay long enough for her to grasp the memory itself.

“Alyssa!”

She jolts again, her eyes flying open. She rushes from her seat to the intercom and presses the flashing button for the dining room.

“Yes, mom, I’m here. What is it?”

“Come down for dinner, dear. I hope you haven’t been working too hard.”

She hesitates before answering, looking back to the book. It must have been hours since she holed myself up in there. She doesn’t remember any of it. She shakes her head and taps the button again.

“I’m fine. I’ll be down in a minute.”

She returns to the desk, ignoring her mother’s confirmation, and turns back to the first couple pages of the book. She finds the mention of ‘afternoons near the cold river after tending to mother’s sickness,’ jams one of many bookmarks upon the desk between the pages, and snaps the book shut.

She leaves it on the desk for later investigation, hurrying out to join her family in the dining room. Maybe some food will ease her lingering nausea.

By the time she enters the dining room on the ground floor, both of her parents are already perched in their seats at the far end of the table. Her mom greets her with a warm smile, her father with a nod from the end chair.

She apologizes for being late and takes a seat across from her mom. The air lays heavy upon the room, increasing the pressure behind her eyes. Even the light viola drifting from the wall speakers can’t break the tension growing with each overdone slice of a knife her father grinds on his plate through the steak.

She struggles to keep from screwing her eyes shut against it, forcing her hands into measured strokes. One bite at a time, then this will be over.

“So.”

It’s her mom that breaks the silence. All sounds of eating pause for only a moment, the rhythm of the meal changing, before continuing as though it never stopped.

“It’s gotten warm awfully fast this year, hasn’t it? Just last week it was freezing.”

“And now we’re in the upper seventies,” her father agrees.

Alyssa manages hold back a physical sigh of relief, bringing a stalk of asparagus to her lips. Her parents chat about the weather, and she keeps her head down—metaphorically speaking.

“How was your afternoon, Alyssa?” her mom asks, bright eyes on her. She lowers a slice of steak back to her plate and clears her throat with a brief glance at her father.

“Uneventful. How was yours, mother?”

She inclines her head, a conspiratorial smile playing on her lips. “Absolutely boring. My husband and daughter were hidden away in their studies all day.”

She laughs before Alyssa can feel guilty. She reaches across the table and brushes her fingers over the back of Alyssa’s hand, forgiveness promised in her eyes.

“Hidden away?” her father remarks. His words flow warmly, a rare grin directed at his wife. “My door is always open to you, Carmen.”

“And watch you approve paperwork all day? No thank you, sir!”

Alyssa can’t help but smile at the exchange.

“And you? You were upstairs for quite a while.”

The sharp change in her father’s tone straightens her spine, and her my expression morphs back into one of bland interest as she turns to meet his eyes. The sudden movement jolts her headache, and she isn’t able to hide all of her wince behind her clenched jaw.

“I was catching up on some reading for class,” she lies smoothly.

“I see.” He nods and leans forward in his chair. “You don’t look well.”

She hesitates, unwilling to admit the truth. She can’t imagine her father’s reaction to her losing several hours of time would be good, so she waits for the jammed cogs in her brain to churn out a suitable response.

“It’s just a headache,” she promises after a long pause, ignoring the way her stomach somersaults as she speaks. “Eye-strain, maybe. I was reading for several hours.”

“You shouldn’t work so hard.” Her mom’s serene interjection prompts her father to return his attention to his plate.

“I lost track of time.” Alyssa offers her a smile. She mirrors it, then turns back to her husband to discuss their upcoming trip to the capital.

Alyssa wastes no more time clearing her plate and asking to be excused. Her mom tells her to take an ibuprofen from her purse in the front hall, which she does on her way back upstairs.

Back on the third floor, she pauses at the door to her study. Just a few steps down the hall, her bedroom waits. Her bed waits, and the pounding behind her eyes feels like reason enough to take an early night.

With a sigh, still, she jerk the door open. She left the lights on, and the glare shining from the glossy cover of a textbook almost turns her back around. She stubbornly crosses the room and takes a seat at her desk.

The leather book waits for her, and she nearly flips it back open on impulse. She glances over at the stack of texts to her right, the slip of paper poking out of the first with a list of tasks.

She lifts the book, the rough cover feeling familiar under her fingertips. The cover doesn’t bear a title or an author, just the letters B.O.F. embossed across the front. She runs a finger over the initials, then the edge of the cover.

The trailing string on the bookmark knocks a pen from the desk, and she straightens up. Within moments, the book is hidden away in the desk drawer. She can read it later, when she’s gotten some work done.

Her work is much harder to get through than she may have hoped. Her headache slowly fades, but she can’t concentrate. Her thoughts keep circling back to Oxford, her friends, and the look on her mother’s face when they spoke in the family room.

That woman has been through enough.

She drops her pen on the desk and groans, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. She’s been reading the same line over and over for the past—she can’t even see how long it’s been because she doesn’t have her phone!

You don’t need to know the time when you’re working. You’re done when the work is done.

She shakes her head in her hands, banishing her father’s words into the ether. He’s taken enough energy from her today.

It’s not fair.

She rises from the chair, every movement sticky and slow. Flicking the desk lamp off, she pads to the door, covering a yawn with the back of a hand. She only made it through two of the six readings due, and she still hasn’t touched the worksheets, but she has all of Sunday to get them done.

She barely registers the walk down the hall to her room. She doesn’t bother turning the lights on, merely kicking her shoes off on the way to the bed and falling face first onto the pillow. Her father will likely have words with her if he catches her sleeping in her clothes, but she doesn’t care.

#supernatural fic #oc/oc fic #my writing #pearl handled shotgun #alyssa showman #there he is #my boy jared strife #aka knock off dave strider #oh damn this means i have to make a character page for her too huh #FUCK #i should do one for stephanie and jared too but ehhhhh #we'll see

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