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coochiequeens · 2 years

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Wouldn’t real Christians want to help the birth families so they can keep their kids?

In the immediate wake of the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade, social media filled with images and memes playing off a viral tweet: A clean-cut couple beams at the camera while standing outside the Supreme Court building and holding a sign reading “We will adopt your baby.” (Slate has the full story on the couple featured in that photo.)

In a post-Roe world, there is already a renewed focus on adoption as a supposed solution for unwanted pregnancies. Indeed, in the arguments before the Supreme Court last year, Justice Amy Coney Barrett suggested that adoption is a foolproof substitution for abortion. Yet the rhetoric around adoption too rarely takes into consideration the person having the baby who will be adopted.

Kathryn Joyce, an investigative reporter at Salon, has been covering adoption in America for over a decade. Her book The Child Catchers is one of the best ever written about the messy intersections of capitalism, Christianity, and adoption, digging deep into the ways the adoption industry wrings every dollar it can out of an incredibly fragile period in the lives of everyone it touches. (Disclosure: I am adopted.)

Joyce and I talked recently about adoption rhetoric at a time when American reproductive rights have been gutted. That rhetoric touches on so many other aspects of American life, most notably race and class.

“For decades now, there’s been a pro-choice rejoinder to anti-abortion activists: What are you going to do with all these extra kids you want to see born? Are you prepared to adopt all these kids?” Joyce said. “And the answer is: kind of? A lot of people will say, ‘That’s exactly what we want.’”

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Photos of couples holding signs saying “We will adopt your baby” have been propagating on Twitter in the past few weeks. As somebody who’s covered this world extensively, how do images like that intersect with your work?

It feels like conversations about adoption that for a very long time were happening in the margins of discussion about reproductive rights are very much more a mainstream discussion. What’s interesting is there have been a few other moments where there has been a similar, if time-bound, recognition of this issue.

In my book, I wrote about what happened in Haiti after the devastating earthquake in 2010. There was this immense rush to not just expedite adoptions that were in process but to open up expedited adoption procedures to any child who was in institutional care in the country, even though welfare experts and even some of the more responsible adoption agencies were saying, “When the country is in complete disarray is not the time to start rushing things.” As part of that, Laura Silsby, a Baptist missionary from Idaho, wrote this extremely blunt and kind of ghoulish plan that she was going to gather [Haitian] children off the street. Ultimately, they were going to be offered for international adoption. The boldness and bleakness of that grabbed people’s attention.

Also, in 2018, when the family separation crisis at the border began to get a lot of notice, there were people who suddenly paid a lot of attention to the fact that one of the largest adoption agencies in the country, Bethany Christian Services, had been contracted by the government to offer a form of foster care for these children. People started asking: What are they going to do with these children that they’re taking away from their parents? Are they going to be offering these children for adoption?

In the aftermath of the Supreme Court overturning Roe, there’s this similarly blunt thing that happened. Two Supreme Court justices — Samuel Alito in his opinion and Amy Coney Barrett in her arguments last winter — made the argument that abortion is not needed because we’ve got adoption. Right-wing politicians have said that adoption is the answer to unplanned pregnancies. And then you have people showing up with celebratory signs and big smiles that say “We will adopt your baby.” That makes it too hard to ignore for a lot of people who weren’t really well-versed in those dynamics.

Your book primarily (but not exclusively) deals with international adoption, especially evangelical Christian families adopting children, sometimes lots of them, from overseas. How does domestic adoption fit into that picture?

The movement’s rhetoric as a whole is this idea that by adopting, you’re doing something more than just building a family. You are also solving the problem of abortion, because in their mind, you are providing the answer to unplanned pregnancy. Adoption is seen as a seamless solution.

Poverty is the common denominator here. One family is being broken apart for reasons that ultimately boil down to poverty in various complicated ways. Usually, much wealthier families are being created out of a piece of that first family.

When I was doing my reporting for the book, I spoke to the director of an adoption agency in the Pacific Northwest that prided itself on being very open and trying to avoid a lot of the ethical problems that have plagued other adoption agencies. She told me that if you look at all different forms of adoption, the one thing they have in common is the birth mother is invisible. You’re erasing not just the birth mother but the entire family of origin. They’re sometimes seen as the source of a product, as crass as that sounds. It’s how a lot of adoptees have ended up feeling — like a product or a supply.

And these ideas make those families of origin invisible by making them part of a broad caricature. If it’s domestic adoption, it’s got to be some messed-up family or substance-addicted family or abusive family. Or careless, feckless young parents who weren’t responsible. On the flipside, they’re made into these angels who have given the ultimate sacrifice. But they’re never looked at as individual people who, with different resources and support, might have made a different choice.

Internationally, you see a similar thing. The families of origin had been treated for a long time as a terrible situation from which children were rescued, or they were written about in some kind of third-world tragedy terms.

How do you think this intersects with race?

Sometimes in the rhetoric around international adoptions, there’s what a lot of people would characterize as “white saviorism”: These children were thrown away, and the adoptive parents or the

church has come along to redeem them. A lot of times, those ideas will involve some fairly severe denigration of the country, the culture, or the family that the children came from.

If you look at the earthquake in Haiti in 2010, there was an extreme version of that rhetoric, with people talking about Haiti as this doomed or even satanic country. There was a sense of saving these children from growing up in that country. And the leaders of Haiti pointed out at the time, “What are you saying about our country if you say the only chance our children have is to be taken out of it?”

In the last 20 years, transracial adoptees in particular have talked about their experiences with this. Generational waves of adoptees of a certain age come from a particular country because that country was a hot spot adoption center at the time. So there is this older wave of Korean American adoptees [from the 1980s] who were pioneers in a lot of this research and advocacy. They talk about having many times grown up in an area where they were the only person of color. And Black or Latinx adoptees, whether they were adopted domestically or internationally, say similar things.

Even adoptees who had really happy situations and were close with their adoptive family will say that something that was missing was the understanding of what it would be like to grow up a person of color in a largely white community.

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cariantha · 2 years

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Hello. Random FC questions:

How did you choose your MC’s FC?

Was it the first pick or did you have someone else in mind?

Does the FC’s personality match your MC’s?

Is it hard to find content?

Is there was no David Gandy (god forbids) who would you choose as your Ethan’s FC?

Hi! Thanks for the ask!

How did you choose your MC’s FC?

If I remember right, I started with a search for blonde hair and green eyes on Pinterest. Hannah Jeter's picture came up. I thought she was so beautiful. She's a former SI swimsuit model and I got excited about all the potential thirst trap edits I could create.🥵 Then I started to find photos of her in outfits that were SO similiar to those in the OH books. I can't wait to post edits with her in the classic grey henley, black mesh dress, softball shirt, and even the cult dress.

Was it the first pick or did you have someone else in mind?

Hannah was my first choice. I did look for other options, but I kept gravitating back to Hannah's gorgeous green eyes. I'm taking a big risk with her because she no longer posts on social media. But hey, there are some things that are worth any risk.😉 I just couldn't get past all the photos of her in such similar outfit choices and wanting to use those in my edits. And what sealed the deal for me was when I found this photo of her with the signature forehead braid.

Does the FC’s personality match your MC’s?

I think so. I like to think of my MC as sweet and playful, and a mix of shy and outgoing depending on the situation or who she's with. But I think she can be pretty serious at times too. Between Hannah's modeling work and social media, I feel like there are a lot of options to depict whatever mood my MC is in.

Is it hard to find content?

Since Hannah's social media is limited, I rely on a lot of content found on websites featuring models. I'm still pretty new around here and haven't posted a ton of content, but I'm hoping to have enough to at least compliment my stories and have fun participating in things like Thirsty Thursdays.

If there was no David Gandy (god forbids) who would you choose as your Ethan’s FC?

Full disclosure... I had no idea who David Gandy was before finding this amazing fandom. And when I read stories, I'm picturing Ethan and my MC like this:

(Found this on Google and I don't know who deserves the credit for this amazing manip.)

I stuck with Gandy for Ethan because, let's face it, he's gorgeous and there's a lot of content to work with. I've found some gems on the modeling websites.

If Gandy wasn't already burned into my brain, I think I might have gone with Eric Dane? I've recently started watching Grey's and I think McSteamy has some Ethan vibes. The stature, the eyes, the scruff... and I don't know why, I always picture Ethan with lighter brown hair. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

That was fun, thanks!

#thanks for the ask!

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merinsedai · 7 months

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Merin's Mediocre Guide to....Wincle.

#1 in my series of 'places I drive through and think are nice'

Wincle is a small village in the Cheshire Peak District. It's mostly farms but also has a church, a school, a pub, a brewery and a trout farm. What more could you ask for? Well, a shop. I love a little shop for all my disorganised needs.

I'm a sucker for a country church and this is a nice one indeed.

St Michael's is a traditional parish church with a Norman Tower. It looks very pretty in the Autumn when the ivy (Virginia creeper? I don't know, some climbing plant) turns vivid red. A church has stood here since at least the mid 17th c; the current building was completely restored in the 1880s.

There are lots of higgledy-piggledy graves in the church yard and there is a fantastic view back across to Hanging Stone (a local landmark) and general pretty Peak District countryside. (You can't actually *see* the Hanging Stone in this photo, but it's there and you can in real life.)

The church stands next to its associated CE Primary School. A cute and traditional looking little school. This building dates from 1865 though there has been a school here for a lot longer than that, apparently.

How cute is that little Spire? Anyway, unlike many rural primary schools (locally, this includes the schools at Wildboarclough, Flash, Meerbook and probably others I can't remember right now), this one has so far escaped the fate of closure.

Since they're completely surrounded by farms, these kids get to look at sheep and cows during their play times. Plenty of tractors rumbling past too. Can it be smelly? Almost certainly. Does anyone care? Unknown.

Wincle also boasts a traditional pub called The Ship Inn. I've never been in but my mum has and she was very complimentary. I was once told that the Ship Inn was named after local legend Sir Philip Brocklehurst, who went on a jaunt on the Nimrod with Ernest Shackleton in the 1900s (Good for him.) ship, The Swythamley, but since the pub has been named The Ship Inn for far longer than that, sadly that must be false. Maybe the picture on the sign was The Nimrod or The Swythamley? (It's a coat of arms now, but used to be an actual ship) Something to investigate. (Full disclosure- I didn't take this photo, I just got it from trip advisor.) Anyway, this place is popular with walkers and day trippers and it looks cosy.

While there is sadly no village shop, Wincle is also home to an award winning brewery. In 2019 it was named in the top 5 most scenic breweries in the country by The Guardian. Admittedly, when you consider where most breweries are located, this isn't too hard a list to top. However, it IS extremely picturesque, set in the valley at the bottom of the village, on the banks of the River Dane. The Dane forms the border between Cheshire and Staffordshire here, which begs the question (to me)- the houses on the other side of the river- are they still Wincle? Are they still counted as Cheshire? I know not.

Walks along the Dane Valley itself are very pleasant. Plenty of pretty pastoral countryside to see and in the Springtime, the forest is carpeted in bluebells. My photography leaves much to be desired but trust me, it's very pretty.

In conclusion:

What a lovely little village! Could I live here? No, I couldn't afford it. Also, there's no shop unless you drive to Macclesfield, and there's lots of snow in the winter and I hate hate hate snow.

Tune in next time for my medicore guide to.... FLASH!

#wincle #peak district #cheshire peak district #english country villages #country church #my mediocre photography #pretty places in the uk

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prophbuilds · 1 year

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MBF-EA1 Astray Prophet - A Retrospective

Although this wasn't my first Gunpla build, this was my first attempt to add some paint to an existing model. = )

In this short trip down memory lane, I'll show off some photos and some ideas I had when going into this. Although I've build other model kits in the past - even going so far as to help paint them - I really hadn't tried it on something that was built to be movable.

I also hadn't tried painting one (or helping to paint one) in decades. So enjoy this look back on my first real Gunpla project from 2014...

The MBF-EA1 Astray Prophet

Like a fair number of folks... I like the Gundam Astray. To me, it's a solid design that can be a base for a number of mods. In this case, I went with something easy for my first real mod.

Something simple...

I remade my fave suit from the long dead Gundam MMO - SD Gundam Capsule Fighter Online. = )

Back when that game was still live, I pulled a fairly decent M1 Astray early on in the service's life. It was a solid suit within the game and it was a go-to once I upgraded it a bit. One of the things I did when I had the chance was switch out the classic red to my usual dark blue. After the game went dark, I kept that simple design change in mind but I never really acted on it. Years later, I managed to swing past a hobby shop a few town's over and scooped my first Gundam kit in decades! It was...

The AGE-1 Full Glansa.

What? You thought I'd just jump straight into painting up a build? o.O So... that AGE kit kinda' brought me back into the hobby. I got a few more, stumbled across my old screenshots from all those years ago and ordered me an Astray.

Full Disclosure: I did not realize the M1 had a permanent backpack. I thought that it came off like the colored frames until I looked in the booklet. This did kinda' bum me out a bit as i was hoping to get SEED kits with backpacks and swap them out. Still not a deal breaker! = )

The last kit I painted (Well... helped paint, really) was a F-14 Tomcat I had built with my father back when I was a young model maker. I loved the idea of doing stuff like painting the details most folks would miss or never even see. I loved the idea of straight up doing a completely new paint job like taking a basic OD Green plane and painting it in a jungle camo.

With this one, I wanted to remake my trusty Astray in plastic... with a twist. I wanted to bring over some details I wanted to do back then but it wasn't possible for one reason or another. I brought up a line art version of the suit and got to work planning out my colors in SketchBook. I'd bring back my dark blue and I'd give it some golden accents to break up the large amount of a singular color.

Once I had my kit in hand, I did something I never got the chance to as a kid building jets with my Dad - I busted out a rattle can and got myself a match small jar of paint and painted it right on the runner.

Before you type angry comments at me - Painting on the runner was the only option for me at the time. I don't have a spray booth or any good setup with which to paint parts. I didn't even have a working airbrush at the time. A can of spray paint is always a solid option and painting parts on the runner is just easier to handle when you don't have a set of clips to hold things. The following photos are from the longer post found here. -> [Main Tumblr Linkage]

Looking at the dates, this all went down around eight years ago. Since then, I haven't really gone this big again. Not for a lack of trying... I still don't have a spray booth or a safe area to paint. I Do have an airbrush (a cordless number with a rechargeable air pump) but the poor thing is still stuck unused. I mostly just brush paint details. Not as impressive to watch but still a fun way to add to details.

If you made it this far, thanks for indulging this look back at my first real paint job. At some point, I'll stick together a work log for the "Mid-season Suit Upgrade" that I'm slowly picking at - the EA1 Prophet Astray Mk2.

#Gunpla #MS Gundam #HG #Gundam SEED #MBF M1 Astray #EA1 Astray Prophet #Mod #Custom Paint

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indiajust · 2 years

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Rosetta stone totale companion app

Rosetta stone totale companion app full#

Rosetta stone totale companion app Offline#

You can’t just jump to that unit without completing the first four. The “Travel” unit, for example, isn’t until Unit 5, and that’s 120 lessons (20%) into the course. It takes a good amount of time to get to a point where you can have the most basic conversation as a tourist in that country. The app has an appealing interface and is easy to use.The sentences you’ll learn are the same from language to language, rather than learning what you might hear in a particular culture. It uses stock photos for the entire course. Rosetta Stone, however, does not go too in-depth with cultural differences.The Rosetta Stone app contains extras, like a phrasebook for travel, reading materials (like short stories), and an audio companion.

Rosetta stone totale companion app Offline#

All lessons may be downloaded for offline use.

The program allows you to customize the sensitivity for speech recognition, giving you more room for error if you need it.

You may also tailor your lessons to only focus on either reading & writing or speaking & listening, depending on your goals.

All lessons require you to be looking at your mobile device, and some require you to speak out loud for speech recognition.

They start with the basics and move towards more advanced grammar and conversational topics. Each unit is estimated to take 12 hours, for a total of 250 hours for the long course. Each level has four units, and each unit is made up of 30 lessons.

There are between three and five levels depending on your language chosen.

Rosetta Stone is available for 25 of the more common languages spoken around the world. This is the most effective way to learn with this method. Do another 30-minute lesson the next day. Let your brain cells marinate in this new information overnight, increasing retention and comprehension. Pimsleur recommends that you limit your learning to one thirty-minute lesson each day. You’re more or less just listening to a tape and repeating things. There is no reading or speaking feedback. You repeat the words and sentences over and over, ingraining them in your memory. A native speaker speaks a sentence and the meaning of the words are broken down for you in English. The Pimsleur approach is based solely on listening and repetition. Pimsleur is named after Paul Pimsleur, a researcher who made great advancements in language learning in the mid 20th century. Learn a few more words and then you can understand complete sentences strictly through context with the words you do know. This is much like it was done in the olden days – you hold up a picture of a bowl and the native speaker repeats the word for “bowl”. You learn the new language through process of elimination and word/picture association. There is no English at all in any of your lessons.

Rosetta stone totale companion app full#

It aims to give you a full comprehension of a language – reading, writing, speaking, and listening. Rosetta Stone is named after the ancient tablet that was the key to unlocking Egyptian hieroglyphics. Basic differences between Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur Let’s take a look at the differences between Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone mobile apps. The two programs that I use – for different purposes – are available on mobile apps. Rosetta Stone vs Pimsleur Learning a new language? Either for travel, work, or just for fun? Technology has made it much easier to do this today than it has been in the past. I earn a small commission of product sales to keep this website going. Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links.

#Rosetta stone totale companion app

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devandahlcourte-work-in-progress · 2 years

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Section 10. 4 chapters, ending with chapter 54

I am reposting these first eighty-two chapters (in 22 sections) plus the prologue and the preface.

These posts will be the updated versions from my DeviantArt account, and since Tumblr may not display all the text correctly (it destroys anything I had in italics or underlined) I would still recommend reading everything there, on DeviantArt. They will also include internal links that navigate between the chapters on DeviantArt and will take the reader off Tumblr if clicked.

This came about because I noticed search engines were finding random sections of my book and displaying them along with some other people’s blog posts.

Okay, so that’s why I installed those internal links in each one… so that if anyone gets to a random section by way of a search engine and would like to read the story from the beginning, they can.

Only then did I realize that it wasn’t getting it’s search results from DeviantArt, but from old Tumblr.

There’s another problem at work here besides unrefined searches…

There is a new species of virus on the internet that likes to eat ancient Tumblr posts and barf them back up infested with adware - spyware - malware etc. The virus goes by names like TumGIR, TumBIG, TumPIK, or Tum(anything else but ‘blr’). The caps were added by me for emphasis so that maybe you can double check in case you’re not looking at an actual Tumblr post right now but one of these so-called “mirror” sites.

If you’re looking at this text through one of the counterfeit Tumblrs that I mentioned, then no link you click (assuming it even copies it with my links intact) will take you out; it will redirect you and show you all of the spam ads it wants to. So read carefully what url is showing on your browser right now.

If it is one of the untrustworthy ones I would suggest closing your browser window and doing whatever else you normally would in order to reset settings.

As far as my science fiction novel entitled “If And Only If,” the safest way to find it is by going to my Instagram:

@michelle.de.vandahlcourte

From there you can click on the link in my bio. It will take you to the beginning of the story on DeviantArt… the safe one! No malware.

P.S. None of this is Tumblr’s fault! It’s the malware/adware/spyware developers who are stealing people’s tumblr posts.

The actual content of this page appears below here👇

Section 10. 4 chapters, ending with chapter 54

↩️return to previous section, section 9

↩️↩️…and if you arrived here because of a search engine and you would like to read this story from the beginning, click here.

Brenda

All right, full disclosure, I am not really Brenda. This first part of her story is being relayed to whoever may find this, in the future or past or on some other timeline or in some other parallel universe, by a friend of hers: me.

My name is Renaldo. And Brenda gave me something for safekeeping. This is going to sound super weird. But she gave me something to hold onto for her in case her memory was ever erased.

And by that, I mean the memory in her head; Her brain; her mind. Whatever you want to call it – I’m not talking about one of her devices having it’s memory wiped like a phone or notebook or tablet.

And as weird as it sounds, it actually has happened now. Someone erased her memory as she feared they might.

To be honest I was just kind of psyched that she wanted to talk about all this at first. It was fun. Kind of like a theoretical conversation about different types of science fiction. But I’ve come to realize now that this is all too real. I don’t know what to make of it. It’s scary.

Is Brenda going to be normal again? Healthy? She seems to be doing okay. She just has absolutely no idea that a particular fictional character on the Internet ever existed. And someone can live the rest of their life happily ever after without knowing about some obscure open-source cartoon, right? But then would she want to know that her memory had been erased and try to find out who did it and why?

I didn’t know that that character existed either; not until recently. But that’s simply because I should “get out more” as both my brothers frequently remind me. I tend to not know about fun stuff or trendy things. I found out that it existed because she told me. Now, I am finding myself in the peculiar position of having to tell her something that she not only used to know, but knew well enough that she was able to teach me and other people about it.

All right, enough drama. Time for specifics. As fortune would have it, Brenda decided to confide in me after all about what she called the Marky Mark signal. I went back and found the movie and streamed it on two different nights; I had a research paper due so I couldn’t see it all in one evening. But I watched it as quickly as I could so that I would understand what she was talking about.

And yes, it would make more sense to do it that way: A signal that goes out worldwide and makes people stop what they’re doing and go into some sort of hypnotic state where they immediately grab whatever materials they have on this fictional character that they are not supposed to know about, and destroy the things.

That could include erasing files from local drives and clouds. But also physical hardcopies; printouts of related articles. Handwritten notes. Art that someone drew on their Wacom Intuos. (Hers is wiped clean of it, by the way.)

That actually makes a lot more sense than a neuralyzer / flashy-thing or or the like. As I told Brenda, let’s just crunch the numbers.

While that may work for just a few people, we’re talking about a number in the hundreds of thousands or millions, if the figure I read on the creepy pasta website stats is correct. How many people can one agent flashy thing in a day?

Assuming they have to go driving around visiting each person, would 10 a day be reasonable? That assumes an 8 hour work day, which would be 48 minutes per person. Assuming mostly urban environments, most of that 48 is spent driving, parking, and walking to and from the car... plus a little time for knocking and getting into a private place where no one else could see them use their gadget.

If so, then that agent could erase 300 people’s memories per month. How many months do they have to do this? Let’s say that the agency, government bureau, or whatever they call themselves, doesn’t mind moving at a leisurely pace. So let’s say they allocate 10 months for this project. Working with no vacation for 10 months straight, our agent can erase 3000 people‘s memories.

The website indicated something like 8 million viewers when I checked. Let’s suppose not all of them were fans of Stalko-Taco. You have only perhaps 3 million of them who were either fans or read the story then decided they didn’t like it but remembered it anyway…

How many agents would you need? If we’re sticking with that 10 month figure, then that’s 1000 agents. To personally visit and flashy-thing 3 million people for the purpose of erasing their memories. In ten months. If you wanted to hurry the process up and get done in only a month, you would need 10,000 agents.

Never mind which one it is. If it’s 1000 agents or 10,000 agents, that’s still a lot of government employees out there running around fully aware that there is a memory-erasing technology and that the government has some kind of organized campaign to go out and track down specific citizens and erase their memories. No way in hell does someone not talk when the numbers involved are that large. With anything more than 10 people it would be hard to manage. (And I am fully aware that during this rudimentary calculation I have completely neglected the complications presented by dealing with international fans of the story, i.e. outside the U.S.)

So what else could you do? Have some kind of super elite spy agency within the agency? Maybe 10 hard-core guys who systematically erase the memories of the memory-erasing agents once they’ve done their jobs?

I suppose it’s possible, but it’s just cumbersome. However this is happening, whether by “flashy thing” or “Marky Mark signal,” it almost certainly is occurring using alien technology. I made it clear to Brenda how I preferred to interpret the Drake equation.

So if it’s alien technology either way, and I am the aliens, I would go with a solution that’s less logistically cumbersome. So, Marky Mark it is.

As a safeguard against us being hit by another Marky Mark pulse which would be more thorough than the last one and would wipe Brenda’s memories as well – something the first one had failed to do – Brenda tried to do an end-run around the process.

Another old phone from her sister. Still another old phone that her dad didn’t need anymore. Both with the Sim cards removed in the course of their deactivation. She placed the videos on each of these phones. In the photos, yes, the obvious place. But also, as these phones allow you to do, the videos were embedded into some notes files. It doesn’t let you lock a notes file that contains a video. One that has pictures in it, yes. But not one that contains a video. But she gave it a shot anyway.

It was just another way to possibly foil their plans if they found the phone and just scanned for audio and video. Then yeah, they would erase that. If they looked at notes files – in other words, text files – the paragraphs would contain nothing but articles about fashion, complete with pictures of different outfits. But if you scroll down far enough, in between what’s in and what’s out for this autumn, there would happen to be an occasional video file imbedded.

She gave me one phone and let it slip out that she gave Wheeler the other.

There is more than one way she could show up asking for it back. One possibility would’ve been that Brenda, the normal version of her, comes to me/us and simply asks for the phone back because there’s some reason why she needs it/them.

The other possibility is that she asks for it back... but the person doing the asking isn’t quite the normal Brenda. To ascertain just how “normal” she is, she gave us a series of questions that we are supposed to ask her; somewhat more advanced than a simple password. A series of questions which when answered correctly would reveal that her memory was still intact and had not been tampered with.

I saw a potential problem with this. But telling her what this problem was would not only fail to solve it – it would in fact create a situation wherein she would fail altogether. That is, a situation wherein the whole procedure of making backup videos would automatically become useless. I couldn’t tell her about this. The only way to help her achieve what I know she’s going for is to change her plans without telling her.

I searched for the name in my head. I had to remember. Only one university here, I was fairly certain, had an actual law school. Scanning through their website’s list of faculty would probably trigger my memory. I’d know it when I saw it. Phone all the way dead; I could just wait about 70 seconds and then use it at 1% while plugged into the kitchen outlet. Asking my mom would have been a guaranteed way to find out his name, but she’d be infinitely curious why I wanted to know, and she’d never let up. Then as the white apple popped up, I saw one of my dad’s old coffee cups, from Flagstaff. Lowell Observatory – that was it. Professor Lowell.

Eileen

I trusted a time-traveler who doesn’t wear a watch. If that one mistake could have been avoided I might not be facing life in prison. I wasn’t handcuffed to a hospital bed; they hadn’t made an arrest yet. But it was just a matter of time and I was under guard, I could tell – more than just hospital security. I couldn’t leave. If I tell the whole truth? Then they might arrange for some of the time to be in a nuthouse instead, because they’ll never believe the truth. This isn’t how the future was supposed to be. Because I’ve already time traveled to the future and this wasn’t it.

What happened to My Future – the one I Saw? That little so-called Chronopolitan? That punk troubadour who prefers to live in medieval times? Yeah. And even though he’s from the future and could easily wear a watch, he chooses not to because he’s in love with that era. I want my EMPIRE dammit!

Narcissistic personality disorder! Bull Fucking Shit. I sometimes go days at a time without wearing makeup or looking in mirrors. It’s them! They’re the narcissists. The two doc-tards and the last five nurse-tards. All of them and their mutual admiration society. And all that eurotrash from Stuttgart and Trieste! They probably caused this. That’s it! I’ve made up my mind.

I’m tearing this shit up and flushing the tiny pieces down the toilet, as long as they’re letting me in here unsupervised back in 2006. I can’t have these notes ever be found. Because I’ve decided that it might be easier to escape from a looney bin someday than from prison, I’m going to do something that violates my personal philosophy of success: I’m going to tell the truth. That alone oughta get me locked up on the funny farm. That plus I have knowledge of psychology they don’t know I’ve got; enough to fake several mental illnesses in case the truth doesn’t make me sound crazy enough.

Plus my shysters being paid indirectly through offshore accounts will push for it and bring in expert witnesses to demolish my mental competency standing. More of what’s supposed to be my empire, crumbling because the vultures know there’s untraceable money there.

The Pyxis! I could clearly hear its sounds coming from down the hall now. My nurse-tard is habitually late and has to wait in line for it. She’s too much of a pushover. Let’s others walk all over her. Yes, perfect, just what I need. So I’ve got a half hour at least to tear up these tiny strips and flush them. My last chance because I’m pretty sure unsupervised use of toilets is going to be a rarity for me soon. As well as unsupervised electrical outlets. And towels. And salt packets. And straws.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

C’mon Eileen, I encouraged myself, it’s just like BDSM with Jared. And... ZAP!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

“Eileen?” The nurse politely asked, even bothering to knock on her already propped-open door, she could hear because she was still semi-conscious but convulsing.

Shouted calls. Urgent instructions. Through it all she heard cries of “get the power shut off!”

Unknown and unseen voices chattered back and forth. “Where did she get wires?”

“It’s brine.”

“What?”

“A slushy paste of salt and water. Inside two lines each of about twenty plastic straws stuck together.”

You would think these losers had seen it all by now. They seemed truly surprised. Another one, on the phone with a doc-tard who was apparently in charge but too important to actually be present in the ward, sounded genuinely panicky: “Holy shit! She made two long tubes by working the straws together end-to-end, filled ‘em with salt water slush and plugged them into the outlet like wires. The wet towel wrapped around her neck may be soaked in salt water too. Yes sir, the current’s been switched off and she’s still breathing.”

It’s a good thing we aren’t further in the future, she thought. Bernart just happened to mention one day at a burger joint in Loma Linda that plastic straws would be outlawed on the entire west coast by the 20s, if not sooner. She’d silently cursed to herself:

“What other kinds of idiocy await in this wrong-future that I got railroaded into?”

The flashlight irritating her eyes was her cue to try and speak. With some difficulty since her “electrocution” stunt had almost worked. Fortunately she was able to attempt several tries since this moron kept flicking the thing back and forth about a dozen times. She fought the overwhelming temptation to shout: Dude! If my fucking pupils haven’t done whatever it is you think they’re supposed to by now, they aren’t gunna! You’re annoying as shit.

Finally her mouth worked well enough.

“Time travelers.”

Moron b repeated it to flashlight moron:

“Did she say time travelers?”

Time to get busy acting Eileen, she thought happily, shifting into high gear but still speaking in a groggy voice: “They already copied me and sent my new body and mind to the future. I don’t need this body anymore. It’s okay, we can go ahead and kill it.”

Brenda, by way of Renaldo again

I ran this whole scenario by my mom’s old friend, Professor Lowell. He was not just a lawyer but a professor of law at a nearby university. I had a voice conversation with him, in person. Totally non-electronic. I couldn’t rig the room and make it a SCIF or suchlike, or even pipe loud music against his office windows.

But one thing that worked in my favor was construction; whatever they were doing in the parking lot outside his building involved at least one jack-hammer going for the majority of the time, against a blanket of constant background noise created by heavy machinery – backhoe loader type vehicles. And at any given moment it seemed like at least one of their backup warning beepers was going; definitely more than half the time from the sound of it.

He apologized for all the racket out there. I told him it was okay. But didn’t elaborate as to why I thought it was okay. It would have made me sound disturbingly paranoid. And on that note, I was taking a calculated risk by assuming that his office wasn’t bugged beforehand. Statistically it was unlikely. Given that the “Taco Erasers,” whoever they were, were primarily targeting people who liked Creepypastas and they in turn seemed to be of an average age of around 18... it was unlikely that Professor Lowell here would even be on their radar.

Might he be involved in some other matter that could have caused someone to bug his office and thus allow my group of hypothetical spooks to patch into the preexisting circuitry and listen? Sure. But also unlikely. Although he was still officially licensed by the state bar association to practice as an attorney – if that’s the right phraseology – he was semi-retired now and primarily focused on teaching and coauthoring some publications with his peers.

Moreover I wasn’t running the scenario by him to ask if it would be legal, but to see if he agreed that it would be logical. And I admit that I also wanted his take on whether it would be ethical.

I mean, I’m basically lying to Brenda. But I’m doing it for her own good. Is that truly possible? Or am I just kidding myself? This guy had taught a course called The Philosophy of Logic, as a visiting assistant professor at another university in town, through their philosophy department. He’d also taught ethics both in his law school capacity and through that other university’s philosophy program.

He vaguely understood that I was writing some kind of literary work in the science fiction genre; a necessary cover story since it wouldn’t likely be possible that I hung out in circles where memory-erasure and mind-control were readily practiced.

To begin with, he assured me that my logic was sound. The two possibilities that I mentioned, one being the normal Brenda, and the other one being the Brenda whose memory had been tampered with, would give identical answers to anything requiring passwords or challenge questions. It would not be possible to tell them apart.

If this hypothetical technology could force people to do things they didn’t want to do, then that would also apply to keys to a desk drawer, passwords for computers or other devices, and answers to challenge questions that I or Wheeler might pose... it would even extend “to pulverizing a block of concrete with a jackhammer,” he said looking out his window somewhat perturbed, if the subject had chosen to encase the evidence in a concrete foundation.

If “they” truly had the ability to make you do anything they wanted for the purpose of destroying whatever evidence you had, then your involuntary cooperation would also extend to revealing all hiding places, passwords, locations of keys, etc. So your character’s actions and answers would be indistinguishable whether she was a victim of their mind manipulation or just genuinely realized that she needed her phone back for some other purpose.

Since she would voluntarily provide them with all the information necessary to look like she was normal Brenda, and not mind-manipulated Brenda, when she came to their door asking for the phone back they could expect her to have all the correct answers.

After that, the professor was good enough to give me quite a bit more of his time to discuss ethics. Personally, I think he’s always been hot for my mom, who is just now coming out of her six-year long social withdrawal since being widowed, and maybe he thinks getting on her kids’ good sides might be helpful.

Later I reassured myself in my nightly journal, that what I was doing was ethical and moral. It was flimsy reasoning, I knew, and what I did was tantamount to seeking absolution from someone I was already sure would give it to me. Ultimately, it will not be time but Brenda herself who will tell; tell me if I did the right thing. So let’s get back to my “confession,” I suppose.

That thing Brenda feared would happen? It would work roughly in this way:

The pulse or signal (which we are no longer calling the Marky Mark signal because we have determined that it is not biochemically based in, and distributed by, plants... but in fact is likely of an electromagnetic nature) goes out into the universe to alter the minds of anyone who the Powers-That-Be determine has a knowledge of Stalko-Taco.

It tells these people: “go track down everything you have on Stalko-Taco. When you find it, destroy it. Then forget everything you know about Stalko-Taco.”

That would also apply to a personal vlog that they created which explains in detail exactly what Stalko-Taco is. Whether it’s on a device on their desk in their rooms, out in a storage bin in their garages, or in a desk drawer at their offices or wherever they work, it won’t matter.

They will go to whatever location necessary in order to get it. That also includes going to see a friend named Renaldo at his house – which for Brenda is quite a bit shorter a distance than most people’s average morning commute. But she’ll also drive the longer distance of almost 70 miles to get to Wheeler’s place in Austin.

If there really is a signal that can make people do this – destroy all evidence – then she’ll also cough up passwords, find keys, act normal or however she’s supposed to in order to get the things back from people...

The professor’s words still echoed through my head: even rent a jackhammer to extract “it” from a slab of cement if you had decided to hide it there.

The only way my character’s plan might work then, he conjectured, would be if she gave “Wheeler” the phone in a one-way transaction – admonishing him to “Never give it back to me for any reason, no matter how much I plead for it.” Instead, if she ends up dead under suspicious circumstances, or in a persistent vegetative state, or just generally acting goofy like her mind has been erased? He is to go Woodward-and-Bernstein and expose the video files to the world! Publicize it to the maximum extent possible.

I gave Professor Lowell the name Wheeler for the “other character” in all these cases, since I couldn’t very well use my own name. It was supposed to be fiction.

So when Brenda called me one afternoon just a few days later and said that she needed to come over for something soon, I already knew what it was going to be about even without her elaborating on the phone. I was fully prepared insofar as the hardware I would need; still not totally prepared in terms of my mindset. The guilt easily managed to taunt me through the holes in the pseudo-absolution process I had tried so hard to build for myself.

Why? Why all this guilt? Well, because I like Brenda, I suppose. And I’m just flat-out lying to her, stealing property from her, and burglarizing the house of a friend of hers... and ostensibly doing it all “for her own good.” How many times in human history has anyone who’s ever done something that they knew was wrong, but “for the right reason...” actually been right?

And when I say I like her, I don’t mean that I like her in that way. Brenda knows I’m gay. I’m fully out. As a popular girl who was walking between a clothing store and a makeup boutique with a group of her popular friends in her new town, she used her social currency to stop some guys from bullying me when I was waiting for my mom at a mall after summer school on my 14th birthday... before high school even started and before I had any idea at all... about what I was.

Now I have my network of people whom I feel safe enough around to wear my “Love is Love” t-shirt, which I also wore for the trip up to Austin to meet Wheeler for the second time. The first time I had on a different pride shirt. All I had needed to do was mention to the guy that Bren might be having some kind of trouble and I had his undivided attention.

Also, I hadn’t wanted to just blurt out the question and ask him: “are you gay?” But Babadook cosplay? Really? For some things you can simply read between the lines.

That, and what 18 year-old cis het-boy from Texas can even name ten prominent artists other than Andy Warhol, let alone give you detailed descriptions of them and their work? Or how many who even knew who Warhol was in the first place? It helped that Wheeler was cute too. I ran one of his Instagram photos through a “celebrity twin” or look-alike app to see who he reminded me of and it gave me some actor from an old Disney show that ended seven years ago. No, it wasn’t anyone I recognized. Well never mind that; We hit it off.

Weird Shapes

The artwork on their wall was different in a hip tech way, he thought. Not exactly a hologram but a diffraction grating sheet over some images perhaps? From their concealed positions and in their two-dimensional forms they heard him compliment Wheeler on it, since he knew by his reputation through Brenda that the dude was an artist.

The Princess of Pentacles, as that particular mass of quarks and leptons had come to be referenced by the ᢈᯒၔ᎘, had selected an excellent hiding place for them this time: a piece of Nancy’s avant-garde trash, as Princess Pentaculum called it.

“Oh, thanks man, but that’s actually one of my mom’s pieces. And yeah, it is some kind of diffraction grating that you’re viewing it through. She keeps changing the underlying images behind it and I’ve lost track, cause I’ve just been way busy lately.”

The shapes were “thrilled,” or whatever the close analog for it in their universe was: they immediately instructed the others to produce many extra batches of quarks and leptons for the Princess – in the form she liked: seventy-nine of the two-ups-and-a-down trios of quarks; enough of the two-down-and-one-up kind of trios to make it stable. Let some of the appropriate leptons tag along. The rules of charge in this strange universe will see to it that the right number automatically distribute themselves. A face centered cubic lattice for these blobs of matter. Let’s say, a thousand units. But no more than about 10²³ of the blobs per unit. Correction, the ᢈᯒၔ᎘ communicated to its assistant, multiply that by 0.950 and that should make them one “troy ounce” each.

Anything bigger than that made it difficult for her to move them on the “pawn shop” circuit... whatever that was supposed to mean. They didn’t really care to know all the nuances of her universe. The Princess was giving them the best results they’d ever seen in this dimension. They were happy with what they were seeing as the two human boys successfully defeated Agent Ranganathan’s best laid plans, backed up by the full strength of the Laniakea Supercluster Amphictiony. So, yes, they definitely wanted to keep The Princess of Pentacles happy.

The one called Renaldo looked on curiously at Nancy’s art. He didn’t have time for a detailed study. It was almost as if she’d placed a video image behind the grating sheet. As expected, it did that hologram-ish thing where you saw a different image as you walked back and forth, looking at slightly different angles. But it was almost too many images for just a hologram. A giant flat screen monitor behind the diffraction grating film might explain it.

Thoughts rang out loudly in his head, which the ᢈᯒၔ᎘ could read but not comprehend. The dude told himself to focus; never mind this art. He needed to learn the layout of the house and identify security measures, since his next visit here might very well be as a burglar.

A few hours later in her extended stay motel room, Eileen got off the bed in a hurry when a bi-location opened up about a meter above the middle of her mattress. It was just like the one the paranormal investigators were studying in Poltergeist. She knew it would be something good, but had to get clear of it to avoid bruising – these things were still utterly clueless about how physics worked in our universe.

Her bare feet were freezing on the simulated hardwood floor, but she looked on gleefully as the torrent poured in from another dimension. Before counting them, she made sure to arrange the tarot cards in a way that thanked them. She no longer had to introduce herself every time with the Princess of Pentacles card; they knew her well enough now. They got the size perfect: 31.103 grams each on her portable balance. And after grouping them into rows and columns, she realized that there were precisely one-thousand of them! Good, she thought, they’re learning to stick with base ten numbers for things, as she’d been trying to teach them.

Next, the tv. On! To the financial channel that always had that stock ticker scrolling across the bottom of the screen. Less than a minute wait to see the precious metals prices. It had spiked a bit in the last week. After her fences and contacts got their cuts, there would still be well over a million dollars left for her! It had been her most profitable day so far that year.

Continue on to next section…

If And Only If

by Michelle Viviénne de Vandahlcourte

No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

First Edition. © December 16, 2015.

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sksks12356 · 2 years

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We saw a shooting star the night we first kissed

Our love story was made for suckers: enemies to lovers.

We walked in the dark in search for alcohol, saw a shooting star explode right before our eyes, and made out in the bathroom at a party that night

I always thought that might have meant something. That the universe conspired to send a message.

When our friends asked us how we started, I'd always say how romantic it was- that not a lot of people could say that it was almost like destiny.

I told that story to whoever was willing to listen- and he would sit back and let me, like I was the official representative for how our story began.

We've been together just over a year now, and 5 days ago I found out how many people he was seeing that time. I found out he was fucking a mutual friend he used to talk so much shit about- that he would invite me for walks in the morning, while this girl sucked his dick at night. That he would call her a disgusting human being for most of our relationship, but the times we kissed his mouth had already tasted her vagina. That while I was gushing and feeling special over the attention he was giving me, 10 other girls probably felt the same way too.

I found out that when we agreed about being okay with sexual discourse with our friends- he understood this as a signal that he could ask a girl he used to send nudes to how many times she touched herself everyday. That 'open sexual discourse' meant that he could ask her if she had seen his dick pics lately. Or how her bed must be feeling her up.

I found out that he and his girl bestfriend- whom he swore was like a sister to him- had exchanged nudes right before the start of our relationship. The girl best friend he was calling for 2 hrs while i waited for him to answer my call when I was alone and depressed. The girl best friend who would cry to him and ask for comfort when her boyfriend broke up w her. The girl best friend who would send pictures of her cat with her legs in full view. The girl best friend whom we asked for sex advice, when all along she had already known what his dick looked like. But it's all 'platonic' he says, it's back to 'platonic' like he didn't shoot cumloads to the photos of her boobs.

I found out that he regularly contacted all the people he had emotional and sexual ties with in the past. Asking them how they were every month, starting conversations and telling them 'i love you'. That he had listed down all their names on new years eve to message each one how happy he was that they were in his life- while I couldn't even send a text to the guys I liked before without feeling guilty. Like I felt like /I/ was a cheater for even responding to guys who just wanted to ask genuine questions. That he did not consider any of his acts cheating, just because he wasn't having sex with them.

I found out that all these girls thought he had told me- how they were all surprised to see me asking them about it; that the 'Non Disclosure agreement' he went on and on about was just a b*llshit plot so he could keep close ties with all these women without me getting suspicious.

Now if anyone asks us about our story, I might just end up saying we

And finally, I found out the night we saw the shooting star, that on THAT very morning, right after we kissed in the bathroom, Kelly was already sucking his dick.

I don't really know what the point of all this. I suppose I just wanna let it off my chest that even the best people can lie to you. That even when your relationship feels secure and steady, they can pull down the rug right under you and leave you bleeding on the ground. That you should never trust fuckboys like Matt Pernes. They will always. Always cheat on you.

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affectiondeficitdisorder · 2 years

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Picking A Bone with Dan Savage (I Said “Bone,” not “Boner,” Beavis…)

Full disclosure: I love Dan Savage. My parasocial relationship with the political commentator and sex advice-giver has deepened as the years have passed. It is a cold and empty week that I don’t hear from him…via the podcasting app on my iPhone. We have never met. But we have lively disagreements nonetheless.

The biggest, of course, is about the nature — indeed, the very existence — of sex addiction. A Q&A from episode 826 of his Savage Lovecast, week of August 23, exemplifies my frustration with his perspective on this issue. I have decided to give myself the last word.

(Note: The question and answer have been edited for brevity. No facts have been altered.)

Q: 41-year-old cis East Coast person calling. One of my best friends has been dating a man for a year. She shared that he was a recovering sex addict in a 12-step program, working on problems with cheating. She's a monogamist and needs to be in a mono relationship. To me, someone with his history needs to just understand who he is and not fuck up everyone's lives all the time by entering any mono commitments. He relapsed in the winter and they stopped talking for a minute while he got help.

She's been really happy in the relationship since. Fast forward to last night. I opened Facebook saw a photo of an acquaintance of mine with what wasI hoping was this guy’s doppelgänger, captioned “My man.” My heart sank and I needed to verify it was him. I texted the acquaintance and of course she gave my friend's mono partner's name. I had to be the person who broke my friend's heart.

She's fucked up about it, of course. Plus, the other person told me that they too were in a supposedly mono partnership, taking trips together this whole past year. Same timeline as my friend! She shared with me verbatim what my friend told me he has said to her: “You are the first person I've ever been with where I don't want to be with anyone else.”

Dan, I don't want to pile on her pain and it's not my place to tell people what to do. But she needs to stop talking with him. I've known her for almost 20 years and am looking out for her, knowing what I think she needs to feel happy. She responded saying she's not yet in a position to make a decision about the dude. How do I tell her that she needs to stop talking to him? Do I share that he was conducting two simultaneous bullshit mono relationships with the same script, even though she doesn’t want to hear what the other person had to say?

A: You should tell your friend: Look, you can *not* listen to the things that I have to tell you, things that I think you should know, or you can complain to me about your relationship. But not both. This guy is an asshole. I think your friend should stop talking with him, if only because he was so clearly trying to manipulate her. “Oh, I’m the victim. I am a sex addict. Oh, I’m a victim of my very own dick.” No. Sex addiction ain't really a thing. This guy is an asshole and a player, as they used to say, and a scumbag… not that your friend can't be the primary partner or the current partner of a lying manipulative asshole who's attempting to leverage women's sympathies by claiming to be a sex addict, so that you know when he relapses it's not a choice he made to do something with his dick. He was defenseless in the face of this powerful chemical addiction he has to fucking around.

Obviously you're frustrated, by this guy but if your friend wants to be with them, you know she could construct a rationalization or she could change her position on monogamy. She could be in an open or polyamorous relationship with this guy. But he's not interested in an honest, open, ethically non-monogamous relationship. On some level, someone who plays these kinds of games gets off on the deceit and the risk. That he’s risking other people be terribly, terribly hurt as well — that is not a bug, that is a feature.

The pain your friend is in right now was intentionally inflicted. He manipulated her into this position. He threw her into the bathtub full of razor blades, knowingly and on purpose, not because he's an addict, and he's so sorry, and he had an erection relapse that lasted the entirety of the time they've been together in this relationship. But because he is an asshole.

She should stop talking to him, and stop fucking him, and stop dating him and block him on all the social media platforms and block his number. Maybe your friend doesn't want to hear this from you. Maybe she would be open to conversing with your acquaintance who also happens to be dating this guy. Maybe, with her consent, you could share that person's phone number.

ME: So, here’s the bone I’m picking. Yes, this is a lying, manipulative asshole and the caller’s friend should dump his ass immediately. (Not that she will, of course - if you’re getting involved with a self-identified sex addict, you already proved you don’t listen to reason….)

Also yes, gaslighting two different women by swearing to each that she is your one-and-only is does not mean you’re a sex addict. It just means that you are (say it with me) a lying, manipulative asshole.

HOWEVER, neither of those things means there’s no such thing as sex addiction. Nor does it even guarantee that the asshole in question isn’t a sex addict.

Sex addiction isn’t having a side piece and running to 12-step program because you got caught. Sex addiction is swearing to yourself, one more time, that you’re going to close out the porn in 15 minutes, tops, and get some sleep, and still end up missing work in the morning, one more time.

Sex addiction is promising yourself — swearing on all that’s holy and totally meaning it — that you’re not going to touch the kids’ college fund for massage parlor money, doing it anyway and being so ashamed of yourself you can’t look in the mirror.

Sex addiction is getting your arm broken by an angry pimp at Harbor and Third… and as soon as the cast is off going back to Harbor and Third. Sex addiction is jacking off so hard and so often you strip the skin off your dick.

Sex addiction is not having too much fun with your side piece who thinks she’s your number one and your other side piece who thinks she’s your number one. Sex addiction is not fun at all, and I’m tired of people blaming their abusive asshole behavior on sex addiction. It gives sex addiction a bad name.

But just like an alcoholic will hide empties in the laundry basket, a sex addict will cover up the most extreme and shameful behaviors. So while this dude may have gone into an “S program” to get the last gf off his back, he may also have gotten fired from his last three jobs for jacking it in the bathroom because it felt like he would suffocate if he didn’t get off right now. It is possible to be both an asshole and a sex addict.

My lips to Dan’s ears: Once upon a time, your attitude towards drunks was “no one poured the booze down your throat, fuckface.” Then you learned more about the disease of alcoholism and found some empathy. You used to berate fat people something awful: “No one jammed the chocolate cake in your mouth, lady.” Then you learned more about the brain chemistry behind compulsion and obsession and you found empathy there, as well.

Talk to some self-identified sex addicts and see if maybe two things can be true at the same time: This guy is a lying manipulative asshole… and sex addiction really is a thing.

My lips to the caller’s ears: Your friend’s happiness is not your job. You might find Alanon meetings useful. And your friend… well, she’s a love addict. But Dan doesn’t believe in that, either ;-)

#dan savage #savage lovecast #relationships #sex addiction #love addiction #romance #infedelity

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addierose444 · 2 years

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Moving to Washington State: Summer 2022

Hello from Washington state! I write to you all from my hotel in Seattle Washington. I flew out yesterday and will be spending my summer as a software engineering intern at Microsoft on the OneNote Integrated Experiences (ONIX) team! To read all about how I use OneNote as a student, click here. I got this internship as a return offer from my previous internship as a remote Explorer Intern on the MMX Incubation team. While I found the work to be fun and rewarding last summer, I'm beyond excited to be in person this summer for a more full interning experience. I think that my internship is technically hybrid, but I plan to go into the office most (if not all) days and connect with other interns in-person outside of work.

This past week has been a bit stressful as I didn’t get travel information until Tuesday and my housing info arrived just 24 hours in advance of my check-in. As stressful as this was, I am glad that booking the flights and hotel wasn’t my responsibility and feel extremely fortunate that it’s a paid internship and that Microsoft has paid for both housing and transportation. In contrast, most of my friends need to pay for housing out of pocket and aren’t paid nearly as well (if at all).

Actually flying out here was a bit stressful as well for the usual reasons and because so many people were unmasked. Additionally, this was my first time taking a plane (or even leaving the northeast) since before starting college back in August of 2019. To read more about my summer before Smith, check out these posts on my trip to Italy and arts internships in Los Angeles. I flew from Burlington to Seattle with a layover in Chicago.

Upon arriving in Seattle I was picked up by a family friend and taken to get Mexican food to go. Here’s a nice photo I took from a bridge we walked across on our way to an outdoor table.

After dinner, I checked into my hotel room. I didn’t really know what to expect but was very pleasantly surprised as I essentially have a mini apartment. I have a bedroom, bathroom, living room, kitchenette, and balcony. There are also two TVs in the space which feels super extra. It’s also worth noting that I will likely be moving to University of Washington housing in about a month.

Overall, I’m just so excited to be here in person to both meet other interns and explore the area! Not exactly sure about the nature of my summer posts, but I plan to continue my weekly posts and look forward to having new things to experience and write about. There will absolutely be some posts about my internship itself, but due to non-disclosure agreements, I can only share so much about the work itself.

#college #Smith College #SWE internship #microsoft #seattle #summer 2022 #internship #software engineering #OneNote

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erosia-rhodes · 3 years

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Top 9 Newbie thoughts on Supernatural after Six Months of Madness

I started watching Supernatural a week before the series finale, and full disclosure, it was only because I heard about the gay angel. I loved me some Good Omens, so I decided to check out a series my only previous thoughts about had been, "Is that show still on?" In the past six months, I've watched about fifty percent of the episodes scattered across all fifteen seasons. I've also spent time following the bonkers-in-the-best-way fandom on Tumblr, and here is what I have learned:

1) Everyone who loves Supernatural also hates Supernatural

No one is capable of praising this show without also trashing it. Supernatural is as awful as it is awesome. Watching Supernatural is like hate-fucking your nemesis against a wall; you're totally conflicted about it, but it's enormously pleasurable and you know you're going to do it over and over again. No one has a pure, untainted love for this show. They only have complicated emotions. This is because…

2) The fact that the show needs to be fixed is an essential part of its appeal

Strangely, if this show were better, it wouldn't be as popular. If you love a show that is perfect, you watch it once or twice or thrice, make a bunch of memes, and move on with your life two years later when you find something else to hyper-fixate on. If you love a show that's broken, you spend the rest of your life obsessed with fixing it. It's the crooked photo hanging on the wall that yearns to be straightened (because, you know, this show is bad at making things straight). It's the stray dog you know would be adoptable if you fattened it up and socialized it with your other dogs, and just like some people can't stop rescuing animals, Supernatural fans can't stop thinking about how to fix a show that isn't great, but could be with a flea bath and a trip to the groomers. Supernatural fans are not fans of the actual show, but of the show they imagine it could be, one that only exists in an alternate universe. They are in love with the Platonic ideal of Supernatural. That's also the reason why…

3) The fans understand the characters and themes better than 95% of the people who worked on the show

The people who watch Supernatural have thought about it way, way, way, more than anyone who produced it. I have read complex essays about what the color of people's clothing imply and how the state of the Impala reflects the state of Dean's mental health and other things I'm certain this show did not do intentionally. People can find depth in the shallowest aspects of this series. Any random fan could explain the complicated dynamics of the Winchester family and the overriding themes of the series better than most of the people who worked on it. That includes the LGBTQ stuff, which leads to the fact that…

4) The show is simultaneously too gay and not gay enough

On one end of the spectrum are fans who are offended you would dare to suggest one of the Winchesters might like kissing a boy and they'll shove you in a locker and duct tape your butt cheeks together for it. On the other end of the spectrum are fans who think it's odd that every episode doesn't end with two attractive men dry humping in a dark corner of the bunker library. No one is happy with the level of gayness on this show. It's always got too much "No Homo" or too much queer subtext, which is why I've concluded that…

5) The audience this show wanted is not the audience they got and they are resentful of it

The original pitch for this show targeted a male demographic who’s into toxic masculinity in a non-ironic way. It was about bros and beers and muscle cars and shotguns and hot chicks who will be killed to further the man's storyline. However, when making that show, they accidentally created a show that attracted female viewers who liked speculating about the queer subtext of each scene while looking at pretty men with traumatic backstories fight back their man tears. The show depends on the unintended audience segment to survive, but is bitter about it, which they remind you of time and time again by killing the female and non-white characters and toying with endless queer-baiting. It's like the writers got a plane to Rome, ended up in a gay nightclub in Amsterdam instead, and even though the canals and tulips make it a lovely city to visit, they wanted to go to Rome, damnit, and they'll never let you forget it! I also suspect that…

6) The people who made this show were at constant war with each other

This show has such a split personality. Sometimes it leans into the gay stuff and other times it makes fun of it outright. Sometimes they'll introduce an interesting side character that could make the show more diverse and then they'll slaughter that person for practically no reason. Sometimes they praise free will and other times they force people down pre-destined paths. The writers feel like a dysfunctional family stuck at Thanksgiving dinner endlessly squabbling with each other—who then had to write a TV show together over dessert. That's why it's such a weird hot mess. The show's unevenness makes me think that…

7) Some people's attachment to the show can only be explained by the fact that it imprinted on them when they were young

Some fans have mentioned they started watching Supernatural when they were kids. It's a pretty common experience to go back and watch things you loved when you were a kid and realize they were…not so good. Your memories of them are far better than the reality of them, but you cling to them anyway. The shows you watch when you're young imprint on you in a way you never forget. Supernatural fans are like a baby duck who looks up at a cat and assumes it’s their mother. Then that cat slices open their poor little hearts, leaving them wounded but not dead, forever be toyed with in agony. The only relief is that…

8) The fandom is batshit insane in the best way

I started following the Supernatural fandom on Tumblr in November of 2020 and OMG, it was AH-MAZE-ING. It was total insanity. I didn't understand half of what was going on, but it was more fun than a yard full of puppies doing zoomies. People were posting detailed PowerPoint presentations theorizing how the series would end, citing extensive physical evidence like the background in Misha's hotel room. People learned election results through Supernatural memes. Destiel went canon every other week. When the Spanish dub was released, Tumblr literally crashed! Obama's Twitter was following a Destiel account. There was a Twitter wedding for Destiel on Valentine's Day, which made the one-month anniversary on Pi Day.

It's been a ride, y'all. I have no idea how you guys survived fifteen years of this. The fandom has been so much fun that I actually sat down and watched more than 100 hours of this show so I could understand everything better. It's like the show is an extension of the fandom instead of vice versa. If anything sums up Supernatural for me, that's it. It's all about the fandom and the show is secondary to that. It's like the fans willed the show into existence as part of some partially botched spell. And part of that twisted spell is that…

9) The show will never die until someone finds its bones and burns them

This show has been off the air for more than six months now and it keeps trending on Tumblr consistently. Misha recently trended on Twitter simply because he was at the Oscars. That was it! He didn't even do anything there, he just attended, and some people figured it out by the reflection in a photo posted by someone else! And just as I was proofreading this post, Destiel started trending again because John Cena is a stan or something? This fandom is crazy and unpredictable and I love it like Dean loves pie! If there ever does come a time when this show stops trending, that will be the moment when they decide to reboot it or revisit it.

There is a lot more I could say about this show, but these were the elements that seemed most unique and bizarre about it. I wouldn't say Supernatural is a ride-or-die fandom for me, and I have no intention of watching another 100 hours of this series, but it's been hella' fun to drop in for a while. The show is just as much a dysfunctional mess as the Winchester family and I guess that's why people love it, right?

#supernatural #spn #dean winchester #sam winchester #castiel #jensen ackles #jared padalecki #misha collins #destiel #the cw #tv #television

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darter-blue · 3 years

Text

Read it here on ao3

Or part one, two, three, four , five , six and seven on tumblr

Bucky

It’s a little like whiplash, one minute Bucky is in Steve’s arms, pressed against the elevator wall, getting his mind blown by Steve’s giant hands on his bare skin and his giant dick rutting into Bucky’s, hips rocking into Bucky’s, and the next minute there’s a crash and Steve is gripping Bucky tight and shielding him with his body.

Bucky could be mistaken, he is a little hungover, but it looks like Iron Man has just landed on the roof of their elevator. Presumably to save them from the terror of being trapped at the very high height between the first and second floor.

Except Iron Man - Tony Stark, even Bucky knows who Tony Stark is - is looking at them both with a very pleased expression and seems to be leering in at them through the service cover.

'Well well well,' Stark says, shaking his head, 'I leave you alone for five minutes.'

Bucky may be having a hullicinatory episode.

‘Tony, I mean,’ Steve looks down at Bucky, at the pink ‘groom’ t-shirt and the ring on his finger - down at his own much smaller, matching blue ‘Elvis said we do!’ t-shirt - and then back up at the superhero peering in at them. He steps back and carefully lowers Bucky to a standing position, but keeps one giant hand on his waist. ‘I guess this is actually exactly what it looks like.’

‘Oh I know,’ Stark says, boosting himself up by his rockets (wowowow, Bucky is four feet from the most advanced piece of mechanical engineering in the United States right now) and hovering through the hole and into the elevator, ‘it’s all over twitter, genius.’

‘Oh shit,’ Bucky says, ripping the phone he had put on silent (because fucking Darcy would not stop texting him) and sees way too many missed calls from his sister. One from his mother.

The texts from Darcy are still rolling in.

‘Twitter? You flew all the way here because a bunch of people twittered about this?’ Steve’s voice had dropped to a tone that Bucky doesn’t recognise but oh, he likes it.

‘Tweeted,’ Stark says, shaking his head.

Steve narrows his eyes, and the sweet open face that Bucky has been staring at all morning suddenly morphs into something much more menacing.

If Bucky hadn’t just come in his pants he'd be in trouble - as it is he can feel his heart rate picking up again at the effortless authority Steve is exuding. Okay fuck, now that’s he’s thinking about it, his dick is perking up and no, no, no. This is not the time.

Please do not let this situation get any more weird than it already is.

‘Tony, what are you doing here?’

Iron Man - looming huge in his suit in the tiny elevator - takes a small step back from Steve, and doesn’t seem confident when he answers, ‘Rescuing you?’

‘From what?’ Steve asks, ice cold.

‘From being stuck in a broken elevator?’

‘Bullshit,’ Steve says, less cold, more heat this time.

‘Uh, okay, look, full disclosure, I flew here in the quinjet to make sure that Thor hadn’t addled your brain with his god juice and left you to get yourself vegas married to a gold digger,’ he looks over at Bucky, whom Steve tightens his grip on, moving his body further between Stark and Bucky with zero subtlety, ‘seems like I maybe underestimated how literally you would take my advice to do something crazy.’

Steve is shaking his head in a sharp, hard, definitive no.

Bucky is letting him do all the talking, having a… not a great memory of what had gone down the night before (flashes of images, feelings, sounds. An overwhelming sense of comfort and happiness. Contentment… but no real basis from which those emotions have stemmed) and also this is Tony Stark, Iron Man… and Bucky isn't really sure what to do with that.

Just staying out of it seems like the wisest course.

Steve, in lieu of using his words, chooses to reach past Bucky and depress the emergency button.

‘Woah, hey!’ Stark says, grabbing at the wall as the elevator starts to move.

‘Don’t you have something rich and important you should be doing, Tony.’

‘Okay, I’m getting the impression that you’re not that happy to see me.’

‘Gee, you have some real keen observational skills,’ Steve snaps.

‘Look-’

‘With all due respect, Mister Stark-’ Bucky starts.

‘Mister Stark was my father kid,’;

‘Mister Iron Man,’ Bucky says, heavy on the sarcasm, ‘This has nothing to do with you.’

‘Listen Kid,’

‘Bucky,’ Steve corrects him.

‘Bucky?’

Bucky doesn’t bother to nod, he lets Steve’s glare do his talking.

‘That’s a name?’ Stark’s lip is raised in a grimace.

‘It’s a great name,’ Steve has his shoulders squared and his Jaw lifted and he looks suddenly one hundred percent a man not to be questioned.

Bucky can’t help the smile spreading across his face. Doesn’t even want to.

‘Steve, you can’t be serious about this.’

The elevator comes to a stop on their floor and Steve’s grip on Bucky loosens as the doors open.

‘Excuse us, Tony.’

‘Steven Grant Rogers you are trending. There’s photos of you in this ridiculous T-Shirt all over the internet. We need to do damage control!’

‘What’s wrong with his T-shirt?’ Bucky asks, hands on his hips as he lets Steve lead him out of the elevator with a gently hand on his lower back. ‘Are you being self righteous about Elvis, or about the fact that Steve married a guy?’

‘Hey now,’ Stark says from the elevator, ‘I’m mad that he didn’t know you yesterday and today you’ve got matching rings on your fingers.’

‘And?’

‘And that's… Not normal!’

Both Steve and Bucky turn around at Stark’s words.

‘When, Tony, in your entire life, have you ever aspired to be normal?’ Steve asks, standing to Bucky’s right and crossing his lovely arms over his very large chest.

Tony Stark has his mouth halfway open, his eyebrows pinching into a ‘v’ over his narrowed eyes, standing in the doorway of the elevator as the doors move in and out like a concertina at the obstruction.

‘Am I a grown man, Tony?’ Steve asks.

Stark rolls his eyes at the question.

‘Have I ever once interrupted you or questioned your life choices in the middle of a romantic interlude.’

‘Interlude? Steve, come on.’

‘Have. I. Ever?’

‘Okay, no-’

Bucky’s phone rings for the thousandth time - his mother again - and, as fascinating as it is to watch Tony Stark get his ass handed to him by a man that might really actually be Bucky’s husband - his husband - they probably do need to take a step into reality for a second.

‘Steve?’ he says, interrupting the argument and drawing both sets of eyes his way, ‘I think maybe we need to, maybe have a quick chat and ah… make some decisions?’

Steve’s face freezes, then smoothes out to as close an approximation to expressionless as Bucky has seen it all morning.

It looks wrong. It looks… like a mask.

Steve nods his head slowly, his shoulders creeping up before he forces them back down, taking a deep breath.

Stark starts talking before Steve can say a word, ‘I think that’s wise, Kid, I have some questions-’

‘Not you,’ Bucky says, shaking his head at Stark, ‘If we need you, we’ll call you, Mister Iron Man.’

Stark lifts a finger to point it at Bucky, his suit suddenly receding like magic and shrinking into a cuff on his wrist, ‘Listen-’

‘Give us some time please, Tony.’

Stark looks between Steve and Bucky and back again. He narrows his eyes at Steve and then nods once. ‘Okay. You have ten minutes.’

Steve glares at Stark again but doesn't protest. He turns away and leads Bucky the few steps back to his room and opens the door for him.

‘Should we… did you want to sit? Or…?’

‘We can sit,’ Bucky says, sinking down into the couch in the lounge area of the suite.

‘Are you… can I…’ Steve looks so lost as he takes a seat next to Bucky, mirroring Bucky’s slight angle, their knees facing towards each other.

‘I want to ask you something,’ Bucky says, palms on his thighs, swallowing awkwardly. Wishing he had a clean pair of pants to change into.

Steve just nods, his mask slipping further and further away as his face pales and he shrinks into himself.

‘How much of this is real?’

Steve’s face cracks, he winces, something like pain, and it cuts into Bucky. Slices at him. He doesn't know this man - at least… he doesn’t remember why he knows him, or how he knows him, but the pain on Steve’s face reaches in and pulls at something in Bucky and it hurts.

‘For me?’ Steve asks.

Bucky isn’t sure that’s what he was asking, but he nods, because he wants to know the answer regardless.

‘All of it,’ Steve whispers.

Bucky has to take a deep breath. Has to steal himself.

‘I want… I want it to be real for me too.’

Steve’s eyes snap up to Bucky’s.

‘I mean, it feels real.’ Bucky twists at the ring in his finger. Feels the texture of the metal, solid against his skin.

Real.

‘It feels like… not a mistake,’ Bucky says.

He’s trying and maybe failing to explain this right. But whatever he’s doing, it might be working, because Steve is staring at him, not breathing, not moving, but there’s colour back in his cheeks, and he starts leaning slowly closer and closer as Bucky continues.

‘I woke up and thought, you know, maybe I’d just gotten lucky enough to spend a night with the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen in my life... and then,’ Bucky looks back down at his ring, ‘and then I saw this, and I thought… fuck. I thought I’d won the lottery maybe, or somehow dreamt my fantasies into reality. And you…’ Bucky looks back up at Steve and his eyes… His eyes are so cool and blue and limitless. Everything Bucky ever needed or wanted is reflected there back at him. ‘You feel like home to me.’

‘You feel like home to me too, Buck.’

‘And you… you want to stay married to me?’

Steve nods.

‘Even if it turns out I’m a complete disaster?’

‘Especially then’ Steve says, a smile spreading across his face, reaching his eyes, crinkling them at the corners.

‘No, I’m serious, I’m awful.’

Steve shakes his head and Bucky nods, emphatic.

‘No, listen, I’m a mess. My refrigerator is full of cheap beer and canned cheese, and one jar of twenty year old mayo.’

Steve is laughing but Bucky won’t have it, he needs Steve to understand the total dumpster fire that he has unwittingly attached himself to.

‘No, Steve, my bed is so covered in bike parts right now I’m sleeping on the floor.’

‘I sleep on the floor every night, Bucky.’ Steve has reached out and stopped Bucky’s hands flying through the air, is holding them, bringing them to rest against their knees between them.

‘You do?’

‘I do,’ Steve says, fond and sad all at once, ‘first time I’ve slept in a long time was here with you last night.’ He looks over at the rumpled sheets on the bed, the bed where Bucky and Steve woke up wrapped around each other.

It hits Bucky that, if they’re married, are they supposed to move in together? Where would they even live?

‘I live above my shop, Steve,’ Bucky says, panic making his voice squeak.

‘It’s not a problem, Bucky, we don’t have to work everything out all at once.’

‘But I… It’s like two rooms and a toilet.’

‘My apartment is just an empty space Shield gave me to live in because I had nowhere else to go.’

Bucky’s body is moving before his brain even realises. ‘Baby, no,’ he says, pulling one of his hands free and reaching up to cup Steve’s cheek, ‘your apartment is a shitty walk up over a bike mechanic with no space and the kitchen from hell.’ He runs his thumb over Steve’s perfect cheekbone. ‘We just need to move your stuff in.’

‘I’m a terrible cook anyway,’ Steve says, huffing a laugh.

‘See?’ Bucky says with an exaggerated sigh, leaning his head in to rest against Steve’s forehead, ‘it’s meant to be.’

‘I know you’re joking, but I honestly believe that.’

‘Who says I’m joking?’ Bucky smiles as Steve laughs. ‘So what do we need to do to get all this finalised? I’m gonna need to call my mother back at some stage.’

That snaps Steve into action, he sits up straight and pulls Bucky with him, so that Bucky is almost sitting in his lap.

‘We need to get the paperwork off Mavis, we need to get our stuff, and then I guess we need to figure out whether the license is even legal outside of the state of Nevada.’

‘Well,’ Bucky says, moving himself fully into Steve’s lap and swinging a leg over to straddle him, ‘I can think of one way to make it legal.’

‘You don’t have time for that!’ Stark yells from outside the door.

‘Goddamn it Tony!’ Steve yells back.

Bucky is laughing, he can’t help it. And Steve is laughing with him. Bucky’s head falls onto Steve’s shoulder and Steve rests his palm against the nape of Bucky’s neck. Safe and familiar and blanketing him in warmth. It feels like the kind of comfort that Bucky has spent his whole life searching for.

‘We better go.’

Bucky nods his head as much as the limited space will allow. They both pull away slowly, reluctantly. But they’re smiling now. The air around them is full of promise.

Happiness.

Even Tony Stark and his ugly tracksuit and his disapproving glare can’t dampen it.

‘Where now?’

‘To the chapel,’ Steve says, pulling Bucky along by the hand and smiling ridiculously wide.

‘To file for annulment?’

‘No Tony.’

‘To pick up the wedding album,’ Bucky says with a laugh. He’s not even sure where the thought came from, but it’s vivid, a hot pink vinyl album cover, Bucky can see it. It has to be a memory.

Steve is looking back at him and smiling, somehow, impossibly wider.

‘Jesus Christ on a cracker,’ Stark says, rolling his eyes, feet shuffling to keep up with them.

They all ride down the elevator together, Steve and Bucky practically glued at the hip and Stark shaking his head at them the entire way.

It’s objectively hilarious. Bucky is holding back his laughter, but the smirk is surely stuck fast to his face.

They make it to the Casino floor, wind their way through the mostly empty gaming rooms and dance floors to a familiar set of swinging doors under a garish ‘Wedding Chapel’ sign, where a strangely familiar man is leaning against the wall only to jump up and shout as he sees them approach.

'Cap!'

'Scott,' Steve replies, much more subdued.

'Hey, Bucky,' he says, looking Bucky's way, then doing a double take as he spots Tony Stark. 'Hey! Iron Man!'

'Who is this?' Stark asks, turning to Steve, 'Steven, who is this?'

'Hey, I'm Scott,' Scott says, reaching out a hand for Stark to shake, then pulling back with a shrug when Stark makes no move to accept it.

'Scott was our best man, Tony,' Steve says, smug and smiling.

Scott looks a little like he might faint at the title, but he pulls it together, nodding along like an excited puppy.

'Oh, Bucky, I sent you the video like you asked. And then I saw all the internet stuff this morning and I thought, well I just thought, you know… did you guys need anything? A getaway van? I don't know. I know a guy, you know?'

'We're okay,' Steve says, calm and relaxed in the face of Scott's exuberance. But Bucky’s too busy checking his phone to hear anymore.

A video.

Of the wedding.

He finds the text from Scott (whose contact info he must have entered as ‘Scott - Cap?’ last night). Opens the video file and watches it like a starving man staring through the windows of a restaurant as the images load and it starts to play.

He can feel Stark leaning over his shoulder but he doesn't care.

It's there. In colour.

Steve and Bucky, at the altar. Elvis between them, Scott filming from the side, a woman Bucky recognises - Mavis, his brain helpfully supplies - beautiful blonde beehive and rockabilly skirt and everyone is smiling. Laughing.

And Bucky remembers.

He remembers standing there next to Steve. Remembers reading his vows from a tiny scrap of pink paper, remembers Steve saying Bucky was his fate, sliding the ring onto his finger.

Bucky looks down at it now, touches it reverently. 'For we are but two halves,' he says, remembering the inscription, the way it had felt so perfect. He looks back up at Steve, who is watching Bucky, waiting for something, eyes shining. 'Together whole.'

And Steve crashes into him, clutches at Bucky, pulling him close and pressing their lips together.

'You remember,' he says between kisses, running his nose against Bucky’s nose, cupping his face in his hands, 'You remember.'

And Bucky just clutches him back. Kisses him back. Just as desperate, just as joyful. 'I remember everything, Steve-Steve Rogers.' He presses his hands against Steve’s chest. Against the beat of his heart. The most beautiful part of him. 'We danced together. We've been dancing together from the very beginning.'

'Always,' Steve says. Oblivious to their audience, to Scott's squeals and Stark's scoffs.

To the crowd gathering around them.

'Forever.' Bucky whispers it. Barely a word. But he knows Steve can hear it. Knows it will thrill him.

Means it, as crazy as that seems.

They both do.

And they have the rest of their lives to make it the truth.

#steve x bucky #stucky #shrunkyclunks #fluff #bucky barnes #modern bucky #captain america steve rogers #my writing #accidental husbands

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y0itsbri · 3 years

Text

gallavich week 2021 - day 7 - meet ugly

thank you to @ianandmickeygallavich for the inspo // @gallavichthings

Prompt: Ian and Mickey are neighbors in an apartment complex. They haven’t ever interacted, but one day they get stuck the elevator. One of them doesn’t like confined spaces but doesn’t share this so the other one assumes he is freaking out for no reason.

Words: 3.5k

"I'm going out tonight, dickbreath!" Mandy announced, popping her head out of the bathroom. She was wearing a short sequined dress, fitted tightly to her body and only halfway zipped up so it slipped part way down her shoulders.

"Don't do anything I wouldn't!" Mickey called from his recliner in the living room with an Old Style in hand. Work has been absolutely kicking his ass this week and he wanted nothing more than a chill night in.

"Oh, c'mon, now that's no fun. You don't do anything," she accused.

"That's not true!" Mickey grumbled, remote in hand and flicking past some news channels onto some good shit -- finally. Rerun of Jurassic Park.

"What're your plans for the evening then, hot shot?" Mandy teased as she applied yet another layer of mascara on her already blackened eyelashes, "Dinosaur movies all night?"

"Might go to the corner store for some smokes."

"Please get something to eat while you're at it. We have like nothing in here." She waltzed to the kitchen and opened the refrigerator door and grimaced. He could admit that a grocery run was, in fact, long overdue.

"Yeah, yeah."

"Serious, Mick." Mandy gave him the look. The Look being the same Look that his mother used to give him when he was being a little shit.

Fine. "Got it. I'll eat something." She smiled at that.

"Thank youuu," Mandy dragged the word out as she leaned over to kiss his forehead.

"Gross."

"Ditto. Zip me up?"

Mandy had headed out awhile ago -- long enough ago that Mickey was now halfway through his second 'dinosaur movie.' He should really visit his dinosaur guy again soon, he's probably got some cool new shit. Mickey sighed and got up, idling over to the kitchen.

He downed a full glass of water and opened the fridge. Yeah, unless he wanted to eat a pickle with ketchup and beer, he needed to go out. He debated ordering in, but he needed to go to the corner store anyways. Two birds one stone kind of situation.

Mickey threw on his favorite pair of sweatpants and his Davie Bowie tee shirt with the sleeves cut off. It was a good shirt. Mickey thought Bowie was hot -- fuckin' alien-looking, but hot, nonetheless.

Mickey shoved his wallet and phone in his pockets and locked up his apartment. Maybe Ernie would have the good roast beef sandwiches today.

His thoughts about dinner plans subsided as he noticed the guy waiting for the elevator.

Mickey had seen the ginger around. He was hard to miss -- fuckin' tall, always going out for runs early in the morning in short shorts and coming back all sweaty, always had a million fucking people coming and going from his apartment. They lived on opposite ends of the hall, but Mickey had never actually spoken to him before.

Mandy had given her brother lots of shit for acting so goddamn unapproachable and that's why he has no friends. Mickey didn't want to be friends with everyone, but he wouldn't mind spending some time with the hot red-head down the hall... eventually.

But he was waiting for the elevator with him right now. He couldn't bring himself to make eye contact in fear that it would lead to small talk which would then lead Mickey to inevitably embarrass himself. He couldn't blow his shot. Mandy did the small talk, not him. He took out his phone and scrolled through Instagram even though none of the photos were loading.

He hardly looked up when the elevator arrived and he stepped into it, leaving plenty of space between the two of them. Maybe it was an unreasonable amount of space, but it still wasn't enough for Mickey. He could still smell the guy's cologne. And it was infuriatingly attractive.

"Ground floor?" The man's voice practically sent heat down Mickey's spine. This was going to be a long ride.

"Uh, yeah." Nice, Mick. Not embarrassing at all.

"Great." It hung in the air, a tinge of awkwardness to it.

Out of the corner of his eye Mickey could see the the man leaning against the elevator wall, crossing his ankles as he not-so-subtly stared Mickey's direction.

Mickey was running out of things to check on the his phone and he was about to give in and finally make eye contact when he felt a shift. Then an ungodly clanging of metal. And a stop.

Fuck.

He glanced up at the dial. Sure enough they were stopped between floors, and not at all near the ground.

"The fuck?"

"What?" The red-head locked confused eyes with Mickey's.

"We're stopped. Why the fuck are we stopped?"

"Hm," The guy poked around at the open doors button and nothing happened. "I don't know."

All hopes of positive small talk was out the window as Mickey went into full panic mode. He did not like small, confined spaces -- which happened to be exactly what his current predicament entailed.

"You open the doors!" Mickey practically shrieked.

"Why me!?" The attractive guy spit back.

"You work out and shit -- do I look like I could pry those fuckers apart?"

"Well..." The red-head took a moment to size up Mickey's smaller form. "Yes, you do actually- but these doors are heavy as fuck. We don't have like super strength."

"Fuck you."

"Uh, fuck me!?"

"Yeah, fuck you. Not even tryin' and now we're both going to fuckin' die in here. Any last words, Red?"

He rolled his eyes. "We're not going to die. Don't you think you're being a little dramatic?"

"Don't you think you're being a little too calm considering we're stuck?"

"Oh. You're freaking out."

"No shit I'm freaking out, Sherlock." Mickey ran his hands down his face. This was not fucking happening to him right now.

"Hey, take deep breaths."

"Can't. Gonna die." Mickey gasped.

"Well, if you can't breathe, you're definitely going to pass out."

Mickey shot him panicked eyes.

"Hey, hey it's okay. Just look at me."

Mickey could do that.

"Copy me. In-" He inhaled, chest expanding.

"Out-" Mickey felt his breath on his face. In any circumstance, a stranger breathing on him would warrant a punch in the gut, but now it was more grounding than anything else. They repeated that motion a few times.

"Good. See, you can breath."

"What are you? A fuckin' doctor?" Mickey huffed a laugh in disbelief.

"Been to enough," he chuckled.

"Huh?"

"Never mind. But, uh- look, see, I'll hit the emergency button and someone will come get us soon. It'll be okay."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm positive. Got stuck in one of these with my sister when I was little, kinda scary at first but we were out in practically no time. She sang to me to pass the time, but I take it you don't want me to sing to you?"

That earned a full-bellied laugh from Mickey, "Not yet."

The man grinned goofily like a golden retriever.

They were silent for a moment.

"So, uh, what's your name?" The red-head asked, gazing curiously at Mickey.

Mickey just stared back at him.

"Your name?" He repeated gently.

"Mickey."

"Mickey," He said it so soft like a prayer. "I like it. I'm Ian."

He had no idea what he expected, but it wasn't Ian. Ian was fitting, though. Ian was good.

Ian had hit the emergency button a few times for good measure while Mickey had tried to call Mandy to no success. They settled onto the floor, leaning against opposite walls, feet nearly colliding in the center. Neither made a move to completely avoid that.

After Mickey had calmed down a bit, they fell into bouts of comfortable conversation and comfortable silence.

"I thought you just hated me." Ian mumbled after a bit.

"What I hate is being trapped here." Mickey stared at the walls threatening to enclose around them. He closed his eyes so he didn't start to panic again.

"Even before this."

"Oh?" That was news to Mickey. That was never his intent.

"Yeah, I always see you around, but you never seem to see me." Ian looked to the ground when he said it.

"I've seen ya plenty. You're the dork with the short ass shorts."

Ian smirked, "I guess I am."

"Hard to miss, man."

"You too. I've wanted to say hi for like months, but you always looked like you were ready to snap me in half or something. I kinda like my limbs in tact."

Mickey swiped his thumb against his nose and sniffed, embarrassed, "Sister says I scare everyone away. Used to be a good thing."

"Sister... wait, wait, wait, hold up. You're Mandy's brother, aren't you?"

"You know Mandy? Oh god, you're not banging her, are you?" That would throw a wrench in his plans.

"Oh god, no!" Ian threw his hands up in a mock surrender like that was the most repulsive thing he's ever heard.

"Something wrong with my sister?" Mickey grew defensive. She may be a lot to handle at times, but she was still his sister.

"No, no, she's great! 'm just not into... well, uh- I'm- let's just say that if you had a brother, maybe I'd be banging him." He grimaced.

Watching Ian stumble over his words after being so confident about everything else was a bit amusing.

"Oh -- cool." Mickey wasn't used to such obvious disclosures about sexuality with strangers.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." Mickey avoided all eye contact.

"So?"

Ian paused until Mickey was able to look at him again.

"So, what?"

"Do you have any brothers?" A playful flicker in Ian's eyes made it obvious that he was just being a little shit now.

"You're an idiot."

"Maybe so, but that doesn't answer my question still."

"Yeah, I have brothers, but they'd uh- let's just say definitely not be into that."

"And you're... not not into that?"

Mickey rolled his eyes. His lack of denial was basically a confession and they both knew it.

Ian smirked and knocked the toes of their shoes together.

Help announced itself to be coming soon over the tiny intercom embedded in the elevator. Sometime shortly after that, Ian had made his way over to the wall next to Mickey's, rather than across.

"Where were you going tonight?" Ian asked, turning to fully face Mickey.

"Nowhere." Nowhere interesting at least.

"Really? So you just take an elevator down to nowhere?"

"Alright, smart ass, I needed to get dinner. Gonna be a late dinner now that's for sure, fuckin' starving."

"Shit."

"What about you? Got a hot date or something?" Mickey eyed him up and down. Ian's outfit wasn't fancy by any means, but he still looked damn good in it.

"Oh, I wish," he winked, "Just going on a walk to clear my head. But this is working just as well."

"Good for you, man. My head is fuller than ever."

"What're you thinking about?" Ian's heavy breath practically bounced off his face. His gaze flickered to Ian's pouting lips. This was ridiculous.

Kissing you. Kissing you. Kissing you. "Nothing."

"Riiiight." Ian's eyes mimicked the same trail that Mickey's had just followed.

"Yup."

Ian scooted closer to Mickey and he swore his heart was beating so loud that even Ian could hear it. If he could, he made no indication. Instead, he eyed Mickey's hand resting on the floor. Gently, careful not to spook him, he caressed Mickey's fingers, nearing his tattooed knuckles.

Mickey fought the urge to yank his hand away. No one ever touched him so delicately, so sweetly. He figured that Ian would have guessed that, seeing his crude tattoos, but he wasn't acting like this was strange. So Mickey let him.

"Fuckin' hate them." Mickey murmured, watching Ian's fingertips tracing over the back of his hand.

Ian frowned.

"The tattoos."

"They're you. I'm sure they have a story."

"Wish I could forget it."

"If it makes you feel any better, I have a pair of tits on my shoulder."

"Ex-fucking-cuse me?!" Mickey pictured literal tits growing out of the man's back.

"Here, look," Ian turned, pulling his shirt up, revealing an insanely toned and insanely freckled back. Surely he was not about to be flashed in an elevator. But sure enough, tattooed on his shoulder was a pair of double-D's.

"Shit! Dude, what the fuck is up with that?" Mickey laughed.

Yeah, this made him feel better. At least he didn't have fucking titties tattooed on his knuckles, though he was sure someone in his family must have something like that. They're fucking idiots like that. Like Ian, apparently. But Ian was good.

"It was supposed to be my mom." Ian winced, pulling his shirt back down to cover it again.

"Mom must've been a banger." Mickey joked, still hardly containing his laughter.

"Ugh," Ian groaned dramatically. "Never gonna live that one down."

He threw his hands back on the ground, near Mickey's but not touching this time.

Experimentally and slowly, so slowly, Mickey hooked his fingers with Ian's and rubbed his thumb against Ian's hand. It was calloused, but so soft. It was a movement so gentle he hardly recognized himself, completely contradictory to the message literally written across his hands.

He was practically holding hands with a man in an elevator. Oh, if dear dad could see him now.

Moving out of his hell house with Mandy had been a good step, but it had taken Mickey years to unlearn his self-hate, allow himself to be. He still wasn't perfect, and he still felt years behind. But with Ian, it felt normal. It felt right and warm.

Right then, he felt the elevator shift again. He tightened his grip on Ian's hand. Ian returned the hold. If he was going to die, at least he wasn't going to die alone.

Mickey realized that they weren't falling down, but rather moving upwards.

They released their hands and leapt up to their feet as the door dinged open, revealing a small staff of maintenance personnel, not looking at all concerned that two men had just been trapped inside for an unspecified amount of time.

"Fuckin' finally!" Mickey ran out. He resisted the urge to drop to the floor and kiss the ground. He was dramatic, but he wasn't that dramatic.

Ian thanked the maintenance people then hurried along beside Mickey. They weren't on their floor, but they sure as hell weren't about to take the elevator again after all that.

"Hey, Mickey, wanna come back to my place? I think I still have some leftover lasagna if you're still hungry."

Mickey checked the time. Yeah, Ernie's place was definitely closed by now. Plus he really did just want to go back to Ian's. He glanced up to see Ian in almost full puppy-dog eyes. The dork was needlessly persuasive, he'd give him that.

"Yeah, sure. I could eat." He grinned like an idiot.

Ian nodded his head towards the stairwell, holding the door open for Mickey, who obediently followed up the steps.

Ian's apartment wasn't too different than Mickey and Mandy's, mirrored and maybe smaller, but it looked oddly inviting and definitely way more lived in -- almost too much décor and family photos hung up around the space.

"Uh, make yourself comfortable," Ian called as he rummaged through the cabinets, grabbing a couple plates to reheat some food for Mickey and himself.

Mickey was no stranger to feigning confidence in unfamiliar locations, but this felt different, more genuine. He actually respected Ian, the man having been kind and patient with him in a less than ideal situation.

He sat himself on the barstool at Ian's countertop and watched him. The gorgeous man who he had been eyeing in secret for months, who had helped him through a small panic attack, who had held his hand and traced his tattoos like they were art. Like Mickey was art.

"So, Bowie, huh?" Ian leaned against the counter, waiting out the timer on the microwave.

"What?"

"Your shirt," he pointed, and Mickey looked down.

"Oh, yeah. He's cool as fuck. Dope music."

"Got great hair, too."

"You would think so."

"Self-love, baby."

"Good for you." But there was no edge in his voice.

Ian smiled. The microwave beeped and they settled in, eating together with nothing but the awkward clanging of silverware and chewing. Mickey was too fucking starving and too fucking tired to care about formalities to give a shit at this point.

"Bet you didn't think you'd spend your night eating lasagna with a David Bowie look-alike, huh?" Ian teased over a mouthful of pasta.

"You wish, man."

"Hey, it's at least a little true."

"Yeah, you're both fuckin' aliens."

"Maybe so, but at least we're hot."

They both smiled around their forks, glancing over at each other a little too frequently with nothing but fondness.

Ian collected their plates when they were done, taking them over to the sink to wash them later. Mickey got up and followed him into the center of the kitchen, still sipping on his beer before setting it on the counter to his right.

In a move that shocked Ian, and even himself, Mickey moved into Ian's space and pressed his chest against Ian's back. He wrapped his arms around Ian's waist, feeling up the plains and softness of his stomach, feeling his breath hitch and his heart beat faster. Mickey's warm breath bounced off of Ian's neck and back onto his own face.

Ian sighed and placed his hands over Mickey's again. He leaned his head back onto Mickey's shoulder for a moment before wiggling free from Mickey's grip enough to turn around and face him, carding one of his hands through Mickey's dark hair.

"Mickey." He said it so soft. With so much admiration. Mickey couldn't take it anymore. He leaned up and pulled Ian's head down so they were the same height.

"Fuck, c'mere," he murmured, lips practically touching Ian's with the words.

Ian pressed their lips together. For all his gentle touches throughout the night, his kiss was anything but. Like he needed him to breathe.

Ian pushed him backwards towards the living room, stumbling over each others' feet in the process. Mickey greedily pulled down on Ian's neck, desperate not to let him go. Ian smiled into it and dropped backwards onto the couch cushions, pulling Mickey on top of him, making out like dumb teenagers.

Eventually, they settled and Mickey rested his head on Ian's chest while Ian rubbed his back and head comfortingly. Truthfully, he was beginning to panic a bit. He hadn't liked anyone in awhile, and Ian was very hard to not like.

"Are you good?"

Fuckin' mind reader.

"I don't know." Smooth, Mick.

"You don't know what?" Ian probed gently.

Mickey sighed, "How to do this," he answered honestly. There was no point in lying to Ian.

Ian kissed Mickey's forehead, "We can do this any way you want, alright? No rush, no pressure."

"Yeah?"

"Absolutely," Ian scratched Mickey's head for a moment, "I've been waiting for you for awhile, Mick, I'll wait for however long you want."

Mickey leaned into his touch and then kissed his shoulder, "I want you, this."

"Me too." They smiled into each other. Safe together.

Neither made a move to push things further for the night. Ian had flicked on the tv to the same channel Mickey had on earlier, the Jurassic Park marathon still playing. After whatever movie was on now, Mickey decided he should head home. He was utterly exhausted after the day, and as much as he liked Ian, he didn't want to pass out in the guy's apartment -- though he was sure Ian wouldn't mind at this point, kind bastard.

After Ian had pulled Mickey into one last embrace, Mickey wretched open Ian's door, only to come face to face with his sister, makeup smudged and heels in hand after her night out.

She gasped way louder than fucking necessary, "You slut!"

"Shut the fuck up," he grumbled pushing past her to head back to his own apartment.

"See ya later, Mick!" Ian called down the hall. Mickey didn't respond, but Ian took no offense. To be fair, he had just been caught red-handed by his very dramatic bitch of a sister.

Mandy grinned and looked between Mickey's retreating form and Ian's blushing face. "Oh my god, Ian! I knew it!"

"Hi, Mands." He ducked his head, scratching the back of his neck.

She gave a cheeky, knowing wave goodbye and took off barefoot after Mickey, "You fucker! I want all the details!"

"You ain't gettin' 'em, bitch!" He stormed inside, but left the door open for her behind him.

Mandy threw her shoes on the floor and met up with him in the kitchen, punching his arm lazily so he spilled his newly-opened beer down his hand. "The fuck?!"

"I'm so proud of you!" She made grabby hands at Mickey in attempts to smush his cheeks, but he weaseled out of there quick enough to avoid her gross hands. She may be fuckin' drunk, but she was still quick.

"Yeah, will well ya stop screaming it from the rooftops. Ian's gonna think I'm a fuckin' loser."

"Awww," She chased after him as he headed down the hall, "You are a loser, but that's besides the point! I've been waiting for this for weeks!"

"Night!" Mickey shut his bedroom door in Mandy's face. She'd get over it in a minute. Hell she was probably well on her way to passing out already. Maybe she'd get some details out of him tomorrow.

But tonight -- he reveled in the fact that he spent the night making out with his very kind, very dorky, very hot red-headed neighbor.

And when Mandy eventually moved out from their apartment and in with her girlfriend, Mickey had absolutely no problem finding a new red-headed roommate.

#gw2021 #gw2021day7 #gallavich week 2021 #shameless #gallavich #my posts #ian gallagher #mickey milkovich #ian x mickey

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wordstrings · 3 years

Note

Okay okay okay, wait, how do you draw such good hands? Like, I use references all the time for my drawings, but I can never get measurements or proper knuckle placing. They always come out like terribly illustrated blobs a 5 year old drew 😅😅 do you have any tips on how to do them, other than reference photos?

Also, your arts and that one fic you've done for tickltobrr this year? They are immaculate, and your fic, I cannot think about too hard or I will spontaneously combust

I don't know if this will help but I tried! Full disclosure, I went to art school but I haven't drawn much for over a decade. But also, art is something you figure out as you go, and there's no right/wrong way to work out how you like to do it! Even just in this past week, I've decided I liked and disliked certain parts of my process and how I'm using the tools I have, so there are already things I'm doing differently in today's art versus last week's art.

(Oh, and here's a link to the mentioned tickletober fic post in case anybody wants it! 😉)

Okay, onward we go! Hands! Tickly hands, to be precise.

(Tools used: 6th gen iPad, 1st gen Apple Pencil, Procreate app)

The art for day 8 called for a pair of hands, so I drafted them up separately in advance to use as an example. The video moves pretty fast, so I hope pausing and scrubbing through it will help. For some reason the right hand was giving me a hell of a time and I did it twice in this video, and then redid it again while I worked on the full art piece today because I wasn't happy with it. So I guess tip #1 is that things don't always work out the first time! Take a break, eat a snack, and come back to it later.

On my reference pic up in the corner, I first drew some lines over it to indicate the basic shapes and anatomy cues I'm looking at while drawing. (I don't normally do this, but I wanted to note the things I pay attention to so you can see how they translate.) This includes the trapezoidal shape of the palm, the angle of the thumb, and the lines of the metacarpals to guide where the fingers will go. I then sketched out these shapes as guidelines for myself, then worked on getting the lines down.

For fingers, I prefer to start by drawing the "spine," the bony back that has the most solid structure. I combat "blobby" tendencies by choosing to accent the knuckles, or anywhere a sharper angle can feasibly be put. Most times I'm actually using a slightly concave line where reality is convex. I rarely am trying to get lengths exactly correct; in the words of my figure drawing professor, "If it looks right, it is right." This is illustration, and the point is for it to feel like the right shapes and movement.

After I'm satisfied with the spine, I draw the flesh underneath, using curves more than angles. I pay particular attention to the shapes of the fingertips, as I feel like there's enough nuance in that small curve to impact how the whole finger is read. More pointed, and it's delicate. More squared, and it's beefy. I can create a nice suggestion of fingernails by allowing the spine and fingertip curve to meet at a right or slightly acute angle. (The middle finger of the right hand kind of turns out this way by the end, which wasn't my intention but I was fed up with it and not doing it again at that point.)

The thumb is one of my favorite fingers to draw, as it's so satisfying when it turns out right. It's only got two joints where the other fingers have three, so it's fun to play with the curves and angles to get just the right suggestion of what it's doing.

Pop a little bump of an ulnar wrist bone in there at the bottom and slap on some forearm lines. Ta-da, hand!

(Add some wiggly movement lines, and these hands are made for ticklin'.)

And of course, pay attention to your own hands! Notice what knuckles you can move independently and those you can't, what fingers tend to stay close to each other versus spreading out when doing certain movements. Take a picture and look at the negative spaces. And the tip that nobody wants: practice! 😊

#wordstrings shares things #strings does art #ask #swift..fox

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electrictoes · 3 years

Text

All We Are

For @dailysvu’s Sonny Carisi Week

Day 4: “What is this between us? Relationship: Amanda Rollins / Sonny Carisi

Read on AO3

They don’t define this thing between them - it just is.

After a week, Sonny thinks maybe they should - but he’s so happy, and he doesn’t want to break this calm comfort they’ve found in each other by putting labels on things that have never needed to be labelled before.

Everyone around them is so curious though; other people want it defined. And it shouldn’t matter - shouldn’t be anyone’s business but their own. But it isn’t that simple. Their friends and family make no secret of the fact that they've been waiting for this almost as long as he has.

He skipped out on most of Memorial Day weekend with his family for the first time in his life - only putting in an appearance in his parents’ backyard late on Monday afternoon, a white lie on his lips; that he’s been stuck at work - a lie his mother sees through in an instant.

He can’t stop checking his phone; types and deletes a message to Amanda - an I miss you that he can’t bring himself to send, because it’s so ridiculous. He sends her a photo of the backyard filled with family instead, and smiles down at his phone when she sends him a photo back - the girls at the park, ice cream cones in their hands, sprinkles and chocolate sauce already trailing down Billie’s arm.

He tries to duck out of sight to call her a little later, but his mother catches him as he creeps up the stairs to his childhood bedroom; she stands at the foot of the stairs, hands on her hips, a scolding frown on her face - he hears the Dominick before she says it, and slinks back down to the hallway without a word, thinking about how he’s a prosecutor and he faces tougher opponents than his mother on a daily basis, but no one can reduce him to his thirteen year old self like she can.

His mom doesn’t let him slip back out to the party, her grip on his arm is firm as she tugs him into the kitchen, “Alright, out with it,” she says and he feigns confusion.

“I don’t-”

“It’s either a girl, or it’s something bad,” she says, arms crossed over her chest, a shadow of worry on her face. “And your sister told me you broke up with-”

Sonny sighs, resisting the urge to fold his own arms. He hadn’t actually told Bella that at all, just relayed one of the many arguments he and Nicole had had before they’d called it quits, but he wasn’t surprised that she’d drawn her own conclusions. “Bella needs to stop gossipin’ about me.”

“Tell me.”

“There’s nothin’ to-” His mother fixes him with a look that would have had him running to his bedroom as a kid; he resists the urge to bolt now. “It’s new,” he says, and because his mom doesn’t so much as blink, he adds. “Rollins.”

There’s a part of him that’s almost giddy at the way she reacts - the way her posture softens and she smiles up at him. He enjoys it for half a second before the questions start coming in thick and fast - he deflects, but she ploughs on.

“So the two of you are-”

“Figuring that out,” he says. He listens to her as she talks about not wasting time, tells him he’s not getting any younger, reminds him his grandmother’s engagement ring is still sitting in her jewellery box upstairs just waiting for him to need it.

“Way too far ahead of yourself, Ma,” he says - too far ahead but still visible there on the horizon.

The closest they come to having the what is this? conversation in those early days is the is this a secret? conversation.

“I don’t want it to be,” Sonny admits, “But if you wanna wait until-”

“Until what?” Amanda asks him, “I’m sure,” she says. “If you are.”

They’re on the couch, the girls fast asleep down the hall and her feet resting in his lap; it’s casual and domestic and not really all that different from the way things have always been, but he lets himself take it in, appreciate the way his world is changing. He rests his hands on her shins as he smiles over at her, “I’m sure,” he says. And that’s it.

Everything left unsaid passes between them in looks, kisses, and touches. They don’t need more.

They don’t advertise it; there’s a time when they’ll have to - disclosure paperwork and conversations about professionalism and objectivity as though they haven’t been managing just fine up until now. But Sonny’s diligent - he’s checked the paperwork - he might have checked the paperwork over a year ago, when she’d left him at his desk with a sad smile and he’d spent the next forty-eight hours kicking himself, only for a global pandemic to stop him calling in that rain check - and he knows they have time.

They do arrive at the precinct together one Tuesday morning a couple of weeks in; he has a meeting scheduled with Liv first thing and he hasn’t been back to his own apartment in three days. They’re not so blatant as to hold hands, but they do work with some of the best detectives in the city, so it isn’t a surprise that they’re caught out within minutes.

Fin gives them look, but he doesn’t say anything. Sonny’s sure he’ll get a comment in at some point, but while everyone knows Fin enjoys a gossip way more than he lets on, he’s good at keeping his questions to himself until the moment that best suits him.

Kat doesn’t follow suit. She’s nothing but questions and Sonny tries to escape under the guise of waiting for the captain in her office, but Amanda grips his jacket sleeve, silently telling him not leave her.

“How long?” Kat asks, “And what exactly-”

“Our business,” Amanda says; she’s smiling at Kat, no malice in her tone, but no room for argument either.

Jesse get a pass. Because she’s Jesse. And because this affects her just as much as it does Sonny and Amanda. For the first two weeks of waking up to Uncle Sonny sleeping in Mommy’s bed she doesn’t ask any questions - it surprises him, because that first morning waking up beside Amanda his second thought had been that they would have to figure out how to explain his presence there to Jesse and Billie. When Jesse had raced into Amanda's bedroom, though, she had just greeted him like she was used to him being there, and he’d wondered if they’d ever actually need to sit them down and explain.

Eventually she does ask, one night after he’s tucked Billie into bed with a kiss so it’s just the three of them awake. He leans in the bathroom doorway while Amanda gives Jesse her bath. She’s been unusually quiet, and there’s a thoughtful look on her face, “Mommy,” she says after a while, blinking water out of her eyes as Amanda washes her hair, “Is Uncle Sonny your husband now?”

Amanda coughs as though she’s the one with a face full of water, turning to look at Sonny with a startled expression. He gives her a soft smile, but he doesn’t have the answers either.

“Not yet, baby,” she says, and Sonny can’t help the grin that comes over his face, however wide Amanda’s eyes go at her own words.

“You’ve gotta have a weddin’ first,” Sonny adds, and Jesse beams over at him; he sees a dozen questions forming, but Amanda pours more water over her head, rinsing out the shampoo and buying them more time in the same moment.

Once she’s out of the bath, dressed in her pyjamas and ready for bed, Jesse throws her arms around his legs, hugging him tightly, “I’m glad you’re gonna have a wedding with Mommy,” she says, and tips her head back for a goodnight kiss before skipping to her bedroom as though she hadn’t essentially just told him to get on with proposing to her mother.

Amanda’s mother shows up unannounced at her apartment one Sunday morning, and it’s Sonny who answers the door - not expecting Beth Anne Rollins to be standing in the hallway, an impatient look on her face. “Oh,” is all she says when she clocks sight of him, her gaze travelling down the worn t-shirt and pyjama pants he’s wearing, his bare feet on the wooden floor. She pushes past him into the apartment, not greeting him or stopping for breath, “What are you doing here? Amanda finally admit she’s got a thing for you?”

He closes the door behind her and follows, not answering her questions. Billie scrambles down from the dining table to run and hug her grandmother, abandoning the cereal he’s spent the last ten minutes trying to coax her into eating, while she’d stubbornly refused and told him she wanted garlic bread for breakfast.

“Where is Amanda anyway?” Beth Anne asks, turning to look at him again. He feels self-conscious with her gaze on him, the soft clothes, untamed hair, shoeless Sonny Carisi was reserved for Amanda - and by extension the girls - certainly not for his possible future mother-in-law.

“Takin’ Frannie for a walk,” he says, “Jesse’s gone too,” he adds unnecessarily.

Beth Anne nods, still eyeing him with suspicion as she reaches into her handbag and pulls out a lollipop for Billie, who grabs at it gleefully.

“No-” he starts, but Beth Anne is already unwrapping the treat, and he sighs as Billie puts it in her mouth. “She hasn’t finished her breakfast,” he sighs.

“And who says you get to tell me what my granddaughter can eat?” Beth Anne says, smiling indulgently at Billie.

Sonny shakes his head, “I’m gonna… if you’re here I’m gonna get dressed,” he slips away to the bedroom, taking jeans and a shirt from the drawer he now has in Amanda’s dresser. While he changes he hears the sounds of Amanda’s return - Frannie barking, Jesse yelling a greeting to her grandmother. He hears murmuring as Amanda questions Beth Anne’s impromptu visit, and when he returns Amanda and her mother are at opposite ends of the kitchen, Amanda leaning back against the counter with an unimpressed look on her face.

“And then he tries to tell me not to give Billie candy-”

Amanda shakes her head, “He's right. It’s barely 9am, Momma.”

“Well, is he your boyfriend now or not?”

“Momma,” Amanda starts, but cuts herself off when she spots him hovering just beyond the kitchen, she gives him a warm smile, “We’re together, that’s all that matters,” she says, meeting his eye - all she feels and all that goes unsaid held in her gaze for him to see.

They fill in the disclosure paperwork that evening; they don’t have to just yet; they’ve still got time, Sonny’s been keeping the deadline in his head, but Amanda leaves him on the couch and goes out into the entryway where her work bag is; she returns a moment later, a manila folder in her hands that she passes over to him as she sits down. The form inside is mostly filled out - all their basic information already there in Amanda’s handwriting, the only empty boxes are Date of Disclosure, and Nature of Relationship.

“Time to make it official?” he asks, and she pokes his arm gently.

“It’s already official, Carisi,” she says, “Unless you’re thinking otherwise.”

“No,” he says, shaking his head at her, “You got a pen?”

“We’ve got to decide what to write in that box,” she tells him tapping the Nature of Relationship box with the pen she’s just grabbed. “Whatever we’re calling this,” she gestures between the two of them.

“According to Jesse, I’m your future husband,” he says, only half-joking.

Amanda just laughs at him, “I think you’d need to write fiancé,” she says, “But you’re not getting off that lightly - you need to propose to me yourself,” she tells him; she glances away as she adds, “Not yet, though.”

Someday, he thinks, leaning over, a hand reaching for her face, turning her back towards him so that he can kiss her; she lets him, kissing him right back for a minute or so before she puts one palm to his chest, pushing him back from her, “Carisi, let’s finish this first.”

He sighs as he pulls away, but it’s worth it not to have missed the impatient smirk on her face.

“I got it,” he tells her, resting the sheet of paper on his knee as he adds one word to the empty box. Partners.

#carisi week #sonny carisi #rollisi #rollisi fic #svu #svu fic #my fic #amanda rollins

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