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fbfh · 4 years

Text

Light Up the Dark - [IV] Leo x reader

genre: romance + action + enemies to lovers kinda

word count: 2k

au: none

pairing: Leo x gothy!child of eros!fem reader

requested: nah

warnings: MAJOR SPOILERS FOR HEROES OF OLYMPUS!!, normal reader being mean lol, mentions of abandonment issues, a breakup over skype call basically, reader uses seduction powers for fun and profit, i think that’s it

summary: You pull some strings to get a hotel room and some cash, the boys get to know you a little better, and you overhear something you probably shouldn’t have.

listen to: bad liar - imagine dragons

a/n: since the reader is a daughter of Eros, the characters are aged to 18+ idk i think i forgot to put that on the other chapters lol

also requests r open uwu

“What do you mean she’s not coming?” Leo asks, all the bad feelings quickly overtaking him.

“She said she wanted to sight see more, and that she’d meet us back at camp in a few days,” Jason says, trying to break the news as gently as possible, “I’m sorry, Leo.”

He bit back his heartache.

“Yeah, it’s…”

The door creaks and their heads turn to you, exiting the front door.

“Who’s driving?” you ask.

“Jason,” Leo replies. You open the passenger side door, gently place the coffin shaped box on the seat, and buckle it in. You can feel their inquisitive eyes on you, and you counter with a blank, resolute look of your own.

“This one’s special.”

You notice Leo seems… off. His whole mood seems to have plummeted. Leo reminds you of a buoy. Even in the worst storms, even if he gets caught under a huge wave, he always comes back to the surface. Based on his current vibe, someone nuked the buoy. Wheels turn in your head, and you hand him the trout mailbox.

“Could you put this in the back?” you direct your words at him, hoping the heat flushing to his cheeks would distract him from whatever made him upset. His hand brushes yours and you can almost feel his heart spasm. You make eye contact at him through your thick, dark eyelashes and he almost chokes. He agrees and you pull Jason aside.

“What happened?” you hiss.

“What?” he whispers back.

“What did you tell him to make him all lame?”

“Oh, uh…” he rubs the back of his neck and you shake your head, waiting for an answer, “Calypso’s… not coming back with us.” You wait in silence for him to keep talking.

“She said she wanted to see the world more, and she’d meet us back at camp in a few days.” You process this for a second.

“So he’s-” you catch movement out of the corner of your eye, “driving?” you ask Leo, who just came back from the trunk.

“Jason, I mean.” you clarify. He confirms, and you all get in the car - Jason up front, you and Leo in the back. You reach into your bag and hand Jason a cd that says ’fun sad angry music :)’. He stares at you through the rear view mirror. You stare back. You sip your coffee.

“Well?” you ask, “Are you going to put it in the player or eat it?” His eyes dart to Leo’s. “She gets to choose the music,” he explains. Jason mutters in agreement and fumbles the disk into the slot. A smile spreads on your face as the music plays and he starts to drive.

Leo watches you as you nod your head and mouth the lyrics. He can tell you love this song. You vibe to the music for a minute before glancing over at Leo. He realizes he’s been staring when you give him an expectant look.

“What.” you ask.

“Uh, this song is really good,” interest tints your face, and he’s relieved he recovered okay, “what’s it called?” You’re a little surprised he likes it.

“Mr. Doctor Man by Palaye Royale.” You two enjoy the music in silence, Jason focused on the road and GPS directions. A minute later, your curiosity starts to get the better of you. “How far is it?”

“Not far, a couple hours.” Leo replies.

“Is everyone there all… campfire songs and friendship bracelets? Cause I’ve never been like, a summer camp person,” your eyes flick to the side towards him for a moment, and he can tell you’re listening closely. He smiles a little.

“So what kind of person are you?”

“I’m more of a… cult documentaries and obscure unsettling 1960’s Czech animations type.” He’d never heard the words “1960’s Czech animations” sound so hot.

“What about you?”

He paused for a minute. Part of him was deciding how to respond, and the other part was just flattered giggling that she had asked him back. You talk for the next hour or two, Jason chiming in periodically, until he points out that it’s getting dark and you should find somewhere to stay for the night.

“Okay,” you reply, “pull over at the next truck stop.”

They’re a little confused, but Jason complies and pulls over at the next gas station/convenience store you come across. They watch you get out of the car without a word and walk into the store. You approach a guy near a soda display. He has on a fedora and a shirt with a kids video game logo on it. He stares at you absolutely transfixed. They can’t hear what you’re saying, but he has a dopey grin on his face and nods his head a lot. Your hand touches his arm gently, and he laughs so loudly (and nervously) they hear it from the car.

“Do I look that dumb around her?” Leo asks.

You tilt your head and he blushes and nods again. He hands you something and a second later, you two walk to the counter. The cashier looks up startled, and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. She stares at you for a second, then says something and fumbles with a cellphone you hand her. She hands you a paper a few seconds later. You give the guy his phone back. He walks to an ATM at the corner of the store. He walks over to you, but you’re in front of a display so they can’t see anything until you come back out. You get back in the car and hand Jason a piece of paper and a wad of cash.

“Got us a room at a Best Western like, ten minutes away. And some cash.”

They stare at you in silence. You lean toward Jason.

“The room is under your name, Kevin Grossman.” Leo bites back a laugh.

You finally get to the hotel, and Jason flips on his turn signal to get into the parking lot. “Park at the Walmart over there,” you point a block or two up, “under a light.” He turns his blinker off.

“Walmart doesn’t care if you park overnight. If someone sees our car at the parking lot of a hotel, we’re just leaving a target on our backs.” you explain. They don’t say anything.

“You said monsters are after us, right?”

“Yeah,” Leo said, “good thinking.” Jason agreed and you exit the car, remembering to grab the duffle bag with your clothes and other essentials. You all walk across the street to the hotel. You talk your way through checking in pretty easily. When the hostess asks to see your in app registry you hand her the printed ticket. “His phone died.” you say simply. The three of you are about to head up to your room, when you turn back to reception. You hesitate for a second, before leaning in to the receptionist.

“Can you put us as unlisted?” you ask quietly.

“Of course,” she replies sincerely, “let me know if you need anything.”

On the way up to your room, you tell Jason and Leo that if anyone asks, you’re not here. They seem impressed. Your room has a small seating area with a couch, coffee table, coat rack, and a phone. Past the half wall are three beds, a desk, a TV, and a doorway you figure leads to the bathroom. You walk into the bathroom and touch the mirror. You notice the space between your finger and reflection, and move on. You call to Leo to turn off the lights. He and Jason share a look. You may be a little weird, and incredibly intimidating, but you haven’t steered them wrong yet. Leo hits the lights, and you said quietly, “Listen for any weird buzzing or beeping noises, and look out for any out of place lights,” you creep around the room very quietly. After a minute you turn the lights back on and look at the ceiling.

“What was that about?” Jason asks.

“Bugs,” you reply, not looking at him, “and not the fun kind,” you mutter.

“Jason, can you reach that?” you point up at the smoke detector. He looked between you and the device on the ceiling.

“Don’t think so.” You looked between him and Leo. Your head might hit the ceiling if you Jason gave you a boost, but you could probably access it fine with Leo’s help.

“Leo,” you said, and he looked up from the wires he was fiddling with, “give me boost,” your gaze not leaving the smoke detector. He agrees, and you get up onto his shoulders. His hands rest just above your knees, and it takes all his focus to not burst into flames. You pop off the cover.

“This doesn’t look weird, right?” you ask him. He looks up and back at your face, hair angled down, and is reminded of the Spiderman kiss. He pushes away the thought and examines the smoke detector.

“About as non-weird as a smoke detector can look,” he confirms, and helps you down. He’s incredibly impressed that you thought to look for bugs - even he hadn’t thought of that, and he’s a son of Hephaestus.

“Where did you learn this stuff? The parking lot, being unlisted, checking for bugs?” You half exhale half scoff.

“When almost everyone in a five mile radius constantly wants to get in your pants, they can get… pushy… so you learn some stuff.” You grab your pajamas from your bag and head toward the bathroom. Leo and Jason meet eyes. It made more sense now, why you were always so intimidating. If he got constant unwanted attention, Leo would get pretty prickly, too.

Once everyone had showered and gotten ready for bed, Jason pointed out someone should IM Chiron, but you were way too tired, and collectively agreed to update him in the morning.

Right as he’s about to fall asleep, Leo feels like someone’s watching him. He opens his eyes, and sees Calypso’s face. His heart lurches. He pushes himself out of bed and sees the shimmery edges of the iris message. She opens her mouth and he holds a finger to his lips. He moves over to the couch, so he doesn’t wake the others. He sits down nervously.

“Hey, sunshine… I really miss you, what’s-”

“Look, Leo, I… I can’t do this.”

His stomach drops.

He knows what’s happening. He had it coming, he knew that. He knew that this was probably inevitable. Still, that didn’t make it hurt any less. He tries to sputter out something, anything. Why, what, can he do anything to fix this, but he’s too choked up.

“I need a break from this, from us…” she continues, “there’s so much of the world I haven’t seen yet, and you have your projects… I don’t want to hold myself back because I feel bad that you’re not with me. I want to experience everything.” He feels like he’s falling forward. His eyebrows knit and an unstoppable rush of memories of everyone who’s left him or kicked him out comes flooding back.

“Calypso,” his voice cracks. He can’t finish the sentence.

You wake up from the light sleep you had settled into, aware of an unfamiliar voice. You get up, throwing on the short black robe over your pajamas - despite their velvet material, the loose cami and shorts don’t provide much warmth. You tiptoe over to the seating area. Leo’s on the couch, staring at the floor. You walk up behind him and place a hand on his shoulder.

“You okay?” you ask, your voice foggy with sleep.

“Who-” you briefly see the unfamiliar voice is coming from a shimmery image of a pissed off girl floating in front of him, but he quickly swipes his hand through, and the image vanishes. He rubs his eyes and his hands come away damp. You stay quiet. You don’t want to make him feel worse.

“Long day,” he mutters. He stands up and says goodnight without looking at you. You watch him get into bed, and you do the same. Even if you knew what was wrong, there wasn’t much you could do this late at night. You hope some rest makes him feel better, and tell yourself it’ll be dealt with in the morning.

Maybe over coffee.

You could use some coffee.

#leo valdez x reader #heroes of olympus x reader #hoo x reader #heroes of olympus #leo valdez #LV light up the dark

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1dliveshere · 4 years

Text

The Last Summer Ch.6

Before the sun was even up Kayla decided it would be a great idea to make muffins for everyone. The smell of blueberry muffins awoke Niall and Alyssa.

“Are those Kayla’s famous blueberry muffins I smell?!” Niall and Alyssa yelled in unison.

“Of course they are” Kayla laughed, “I’ve been making them ever since we became friends 7 years ago.”

As everyone began to make their way into the living area Kayla happened to look outside, “Y’all we should go watch the sunrise from the top of the RV while eating breakfast!”

“Kayla you sound like a seven year old that just got told they were going to a candy store”

“Louis, says the person that acts like said 7 year old”

After everyone got their breakfast they headed out of the RV.

“I just have one question how the heck do we get up to the top of the RV??”

All the boys looked at each other and knew exactly what to do. Each one wakes up to their girlfriend and picked them up and attempted lifting them up.

After struggling for 2 minutes and making all sorts of grunting sounds the boys finally gave up.

“You know what us girls got you. Time to put our cheer into practice ladies.”

“Letssss goooooo” Alyssa yelled across the parking lot.

All at once the girls ran over to where Zayn was standing and got into their forms and lifted Zayn all the way to the roof of the RV.

“What the fre-woah it looks so cool from up here.”

After quickly boosting all the boys up to the roof they all helped one another up there too until it got down to Kayla and Alyssa.

“Well crap how the heck are we going to get up there?” Alyssa looked at Kayla.

“I got you boo. It’s time to bust out the two people pyramid.” Kayla smirked

A bunch of high pitched ooooooos left the girls mouths while the guys looked at one another with confused expressions.

Kayla quickly got on her hands and knees while alyssa climbed on top of her back. Slowly Kayla started rising while Alyssa transitioned her feet to Kayla’s shoulders and then head. Kayla slowly starts to stand up while screaming.

“This seems like a really bad idea.” Liam states.

“No Sh-dip Sherlock”

After screaming for literally 30 seconds Kayla got Alyssa on top of the RV. Alyssa then proceeds to lay on her stomach while the other girls lower her down the side of the vehicle. Kayla grabs Alyssa’s hand and uses it as a climbing rope while walked up the side of the RV.

“FREAKING YOU DID NOT JUST PUT YOUR FREAKING DIRTY DIRTBAG SHOES ON THE SIDE OFMY FREAKING SPARKLING RV”

“Take a chill pill. At least we are all up here and have everything we need.”

“Uhh I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but....... I forgot the milk”

“Louis you had ONE freaking job” Kayla pointed at Louis.

“Wait I got you” Louis approaches the windshield and slides down it onto the ground. Leaving a streaky butt mark all the way.

Harry makes a shocked face and is frozen like that until Louis appears with the milk.

“Great now we have to go to the car wash” Harry grunts.

After sitting and watching the sunset everyone slides down like Louis did to go get ready.

***

“I don’t know what to wear” Alyssa flopped on the bed in the master bedroom.

“We just washed all of our clothes, how could you not know what to wear?” Kayla looked at Alyssa through the mirror as she finished her makeup.

“It’s not that I don’t have anything to wear. It’s just I don’t know what to wear. What are you going to wear?”

“My light washed ripped jeans, with this button up shirt, and my white converse.”

“You’re going to look hot boo”

“Thanks girl” Kayla smiled and laughed “I’ll help you pick something out”

Kayla chucked Alyssa’s suitcase onto the bed and started digging through it.

“How about this?” Kayla help up a pair of green pants, a graphic tee, and white shoes?”

“How the heck do you do that? I’ve been staring at that same suitcase for twenty minutes and found nothing.”

“I’m just that talented.”

After quickly applying some light makeup and fixing their hair, the girls were ready.

“Finally. We can go.” Louis breathed out.

“Oh shut of Louis, you are usually the last one done so this is a first.”

After the short drive to the Sunflower Field everyone hopped off the bus. Surprisingly it wasn’t super busy. They appeared to be the only people there besides the woman that owned it.

“Hello! I need 10 tickets please.” Harry flashed his signature smile at the lady.

“That will be $30”

After exchanging the money for the tickets the group was off to the beginning of the maze.

“Okay according to this sign the maze is 2 miles long. So luckily it won’t be too difficult.”

“Speak for yourself” Kayla laughed. “Liam you are in tip top shape so even if it was 12 miles you would still say that.”

“Guys I just had a great idea!”

“What is it Maya?”

“What if all the couples have a competition? We all time ourselves to see who makes it out on the other side first.”

“That’s a great idea! Let’s do it!” Gigi whips out her phone.

After everyone was paired with their boyfriend/girlfriend they all started their phone timers and took off running in different directions. Everyone was yelling so loudly to each other that you could hear their voices coming from inside the maze.

“Liam we need to turn this way!”

“Maya are you sure??”

“Harry run!!!!”

“Watch out for that bee Louis!!”

“Ahhhhh”

“I’m so freaking confused Alyssa”

“Me too Niall!”

“We just went in a giant circle!”

Everyone beside Louis and Eleanor had made it out on the other side.

“What is taking them so long?” questioned Zayn.

While everyone was discussing where they had gone their conversation was interrupted by a screaming Louis.

“Guys!!!!!! Run!!!!!”

Without even questioning what was happening the whole group took sprinting as fast as possible to the RV. Once inside Harry slammed the door shut.

Once everyone caught their breath they all turned to Louis.

“What was that all about?!”

“Louis here thought it be a good idea to knock a beehive down.”

“Eleanor I didn’t do it on purpose.”

“How’d you manage to do that?” Liam asked through laughter.

“I couldn’t stop running and I ran into a tree and knocked it down.” Louis sheepishly responsed. “Whoopsie”

“Oh my gosh Louis” Gigi cackled.

“Can we just forget that happened? Wasn’t my brightest moment.”

“Sure thing Lou” Kayla smiled.

“Well that was fun! I’m starving though so can we get food?”

“You’re wish is my command Niall. Kayla, I’m sick of driving, will you drive for a little bit?”

“Yeah that’s fine babe.”

Once everyone was seated and ready to hit the road again, Kayla headed to the local Walmart to stock up on food.

The sun was just setting as they approached Walmart. Luckily it appeared Walmart was not busy at all.

“Okay, Kayla and Harry, you are in charge of healthy food; Alyssa and Niall, you are in charge of junk food; and the rest of us will get drinks and any other stuff we need.” Liam spoke quite proud of himself that he had everything organized.

Everyone that was listen went running in all different directions to get to the aisle they needed.

Kayla and Harry bought fruit,veggies, and some other healthy snacks.

Alyssa and Niall bought chips, chocolate, and ice cream; quite the combination.

Everyone else bought pop, water, milk, and random snackage because they knew the other two couples wouldn’t buy enough to live on.

Everyone met back at the cash register to pay for it. Harry insisted on paying for everything.

“Harry you are not going to spend $100 on food for us.”

“Liam shut up. I can do what I want.” Harry smirked as he quickly gave the card to the cashier.

All the boys refused to let the girls carry anything so they all had bags piled on both of their arms as they ran across the parking lot. Once inside everyone out the groceries away and made supper.

“What’s on the menu tonight M’lady?” Zayn tipped an imaginary hat towards Gigi.

“Well I’m making baking chicken with honey mustard dressing and then we are having side salads.”

“I’m happy we brought you. Without you we would eat pizza every night” Niall laughed, “not that I’d complain or anything.”

During dinner everyone was spread all over the RV. Kayla and Alyssa were in the front; Zayn, Gigi, and Niall were on one couch; Harry, Louis, and Eleanor were on the other couch; and Liam and Maya were at the table.

The conversation was filled with fun things they had done throughout the day and things they wanted to do during this trip. Liam was currently discussing how he had never been to Chicago in his entire life.

“Liam that’s literally so random. I’ve been to Chicago at least 10 times.”

“Well that’s easy for you Harold. Your sister goes to college there.”

“I didn’t realize Gemma was going to Chicago University.” Gigi half yelled, “we should go visit her.”

“Oh my gosh Harry we should!! Cmon I’ll even drive.”

“I don’t know guys. She might not want to see us all.” Harry rubbed the back of his neck.

“Oh come on. It’s Gemma! She loves us!” Alyssa smiled.

“Ok ok. Fine. We can go for a couple days. That way I can see her and Liam can see Chicago.”

The whole bus erupted in cheers.

“Plus I’ve heard Chicago clubs really know how to party.” Louis wiggles his eyebrows.

“Umm Lou, in case you forgot, we aren’t old enough.”

“Don’t worry Eleanor. I got that covered.”

Everyone looked at one another, eyes filled with excitement and confusion at what Louis had just said.

All of the girls pitched in to clean up the kitchen. While Kayla headed towards the interstate that would take them straight into Chicago.

Niall called all the boys to follow him into the back bedroom because he has news. The girls were extremely confused why they all ditched them.

Once all the boys were in the room, Niall shut the door and turned to look at them. “I’ve made a life changing decision. I’m going to ask Alyssa to marry me.”

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thenonconformistcurmudgeon · 7 years

Text

Modern Love

Bates was an internet blogger with a meager following which was rapidly diminishing. He hoped to be discovered by a publisher and become a celebrated writer of renown. A sort of modern day Lana Turner discovered in the drugstore story which he recently found out was not entirely true.

His day job was working for the State of Nevada in a cubicle outside of Reno. He worked with facts and figures and although he preferred pencils and log books, he had to use computer spreadsheets. It was one of many parts of daily life he felt discordant with. It was 4:40 on a Friday and his phone reverberated with a special ding which signaled someone responded to his last blog post which was now 3 days old. His last post was:

Writers Lament

Oh, the life of obscurity, banging away at my Underwood typewriter, with only tea and biscuits as companions.

The response came from one of his few remaining followers and she said. You are lucky to have the tea and biscuits. He was not upset with the response as he knew it to be true. Little did the responder know however, how lucky he truly was because he also had and would always have Julie.

Julie came into his life while working at his cubicle. She worked in another part of the state workforce 10 minutes away in Reno and she sent weekly e-mails at approximately 4:50 on Fridays to all state employees informing them about upcoming weekly state events. He didn’t usually think about the e-mails or Julie until one Friday the e-mail didn’t show up. He wondered what happened to her and thought she may have gone on vacation. An e-mail did show up the next week on a Tuesday which made him wonder even more and he suddenly wished to know more about her and what she might have been up to.

Bates went home that night to find out more about Julie. In modern life, there is no more peeking through the keyhole as you can find out all you need to know on social media. It was easy to find Julie French of Reno on Facebook. There, her life spread out before him. She did go on vacation with her husband and son last week as there were pictures to prove it. Born and raised in Reno, she was apparently quite happy with her job and family. One could see a series of relationships before husband Bob, and the son was from a prior one. Another relationship was of the same sex variety which made her more intriguing to Bates but she felt bad for Julie as the women left her for another woman. She was a music fan of Liz Phair and Bates conveniently ignored her predilection for reality TV such as Jersey Shore. It was easy to figure out her age from her Instagram and Tumblr accounts. Bob, who managed a mini golf establishment did not have any prior children, and given their ages, he expected Bob to press for a baby.

Bates followed Julie on social media, better known as stalking. She did have a baby with Bob but the marital heaven in the photos must have faded over time as Bob eventually left her for another man. Bates wished he could meet her and sweep her off her feet now that she was free but it did seem depraved to look for her around town and he did have his blog that he was dedicated to.

The day did come when he did run into her. On this day, he found himself writing longhand an idea for a blog post about Taxidermy birds while in a health food store café. You know the type of place that has 45 types of granola in bulk. This particular store was so sanctimonious that it did not carry any granola bars that were wrapped. The shopping carts were made of wood, from a locally sourced tree farm that captured and released tree boring insects. They provided no bags for purchases. Staff was trained to raise an eyebrow and clear their throat if someone brought a plastic bag to carry their groceries. If it was a Walmart bag, the customer was surrounded by the entire staff with some tapping a foot, others drumming fingers on the counters, and a scarlet A was painted on the customer outerwear. Some were willing to undergo such humiliation as the organic pizza was to die for.

The café had the usual cast of characters. Young men pierced and tattooed, thinking they were the bee’s knees, but they were not old enough to know of that term. Young women in flowy dresses, heavily beaded, bought from local street vendors who did not believe in changing out the screens on their hash pipes or frequently changing undergarments.

On this day, Julie appeared at the cashier checking out but forgot to bring bags. She stumbled and fumbled and was dropping some items and no one came to help. Bates did approach her warily and picked up some items. His first instinct was to stack them back in her arms but then they fell off again. After a couple attempts, he realized his mistake to heap them back up and told her he would help carry them out to her vehicle and she was appreciative. There was so much he wanted to say but was dumbfounded. He wanted to tell her that he had no need to mentally undress her because he had already seen her in a bikini on the computer. He wanted to tell her he would never leave her like the others but knew enough to hold that thought. They walked out in silence, nary a comment about the weather. Sadly, Bates awkwardness was on full display, and it was clear Julie had not the slightest interest in their meeting other than getting her purchases in the car. The chance encounter then ended quickly with a thank you and you’re welcome.

Bates was fearful of running into her again due to his poor social execution, so he chose a different café to have organic coffee raised responsibly with well-paid bean pickers. There were photos of the highly paid dark-skinned bean farmers. It was noted that their dental and health plans were in fact better than his.

Some years passed and Bates was in a café in Paris. It was a shoebox sized café with tiny tables in which strangers had to share space. She slipped in sideways like a cat and sat down at his table. It was Julie. The two Americans shared a conversation a long with the table. She did not acknowledge that she remembered him from the health food store and he kept mum about what he knew about her and their prior encounter. Bates told her he was from North Dakota. He already knew that she now had a British boyfriend, Terry and she did say she was soon going back to London for a brief stay before returning to Nevada. She ordered a chocolate mousse and offered to share but Bates said no. He knew the electric sparks between them only went in one direction and the sharing of the mousse would be too much of a jolt for him to handle. However, she took his spoon, put some mousse in it, and brought it to his mouth and said to him, “please have this little bit of instant bliss”. He succumbed.

Bates rented a flat in London for a couple months with a view of Waterloo Bridge as he had considerable time saved up from work for such a leave. He would stare out of his window for hours with the hopes of inspiration for his blog. His Underwood typewriter at the ready. He would type his work out and then scan it in. He liked how the typewriter ribbon faded at times and how it made his blog look more archaic. One day he saw Terry and Julie cross over the river looking safe and sound. He gazed out the window for hours more, all he needed was the sunset and he was in paradise. He then became inspired and wrote extensively about odd topics such as showers, knives, motels off the highway, and desirable but unattainable women. His readership picked up considerably but he was not published or became well known.

It was approaching 4:50 in Bate’s cubicle, and sure enough the e-mail came from Yvette Laliberte from the state office about 10 miles away. He felt it was sent just for him and he treasured that time together. A little bit of instant bliss.

#Modern Love

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ecrivainescence · 7 years

Text

@constant-gesticulation hi cat! i’m your backup gifter for @voltron-ss. merry belated christmas/new year and stuff. you have been super patient. you rock. i hope you enjoy.

title: maurice

word count: 4668

summary: honestly, this is the silliest thing i have ever written, and it is one long exercise in suspension of disbelief. it contains mothman, dated cultural references, and a random shot of seriousness that did not make itself apparent until about midnight. also bonding, and poison ivy. and red bull. and shiro is allergic to everything.

The campfire stories were Allura’s idea.

“On Altea,” she said, “we told stories of creatures that wandered the night in the waving reed forests. They left wooden stick figures hanging from the waving reeds. They left rock cairns. And if you disturbed one of them you were damned. My father warned me away from them time and time again.” Her face was illuminated by the dim glow of the fire, and her hair was witchy-silver. Her voice took on the quality of an ancient story-keeper.

“But there were three young explorers who did not heed the warnings not to speak of the one that lived in the forest outside our city. She was said to be a malevolent old witch who never showed herself to the people, but who had a long bloody history. Her modus operandi was taking two victims at a time: one to kill first, and one to stand in the corner listening to the screams of the first, awaiting their own death.

“The three explorers were never again seen after the first day they entered the forest, but a year later we found their footage. One of them had accidentally disturbed one of the cairns, and after that things started to unravel. They wandered around in circles for days, lost in the forest, finding wooden stick figures hung from the trees, and being pursued by a being that cast rocks at their tent in the night. Eventually one of them disappeared, and the other two found nothing but a bit of hair and a couple of teeth and a piece of his tongue.”

“Hold on just a hot minute,” said Hunk, artfully constructing a double-decker s’more. “You’re just recycling the plot of The Blair Witch Project.”

“So what if I am?” sniffed Allura. “It was a good movie.”

“No movie retellings,” said Hunk. “It’s the Campfire Story Honor Code.”

Allura stuck out her tongue at him.

“I’ve got one,” piped Keith from his position on a stump across the fire. “It’s a good one.”

“Here we go,” muttered Lance. Shiro shushed him. Pidge leaned in.

Ignoring him, Keith proceeded. “Point Pleasant, West Virginia. 1966. The Scarberrys swore the thing they saw was not a man, nor a bird, although it bore some resemblance to both --”

“It’s Mothman again,” said Lance.

“Got a problem?”

“Oh, I have many problems,” said Lance, “and among them are Mothman, Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and anything you found on Creepypasta.”

“Well,” said Keith. “You asked for stories. All my stories are about the dark underbelly of the American wilderness.”

“We’re twenty minutes from a Chick-Fil-A,” griped Lance. “That’s your wilderness.”

Hunk sighed. They’d been like this for days – tense, edgy, at each other’s throats. They weren’t always quite so flammable, but something about the close proximity of RV travel made them a powder keg: You spilled coffee on my notebook. You used my toothbrush. What do you mean you ate the last slice of beef jerky.

He expected Shiro to chime in a peacemaker, but then he remembered Shiro was already asleep in his bunk inside the camper due to being extremely fucking tired of everything. Not only was he in charge of driving, but the strange shift of their return to Earth had revealed a lot of unexpected things. Like that Shiro was allergic as hell to everything. Mangoes. Tree nuts. Certain types of sunscreen. Allura’s shampoo. In fact, they carried an Epi-Pen or six with them at all times and tacked a list of his allergies on the tiny refrigerator, ready in the case that he broke out in hives, as he’d already done thrice.

So yeah. Shiro was tired.

Keith and Lance had somehow gotten back to bickering.

“Lance left our food out for bears!”

“Keith almost abducted somebody else’s dog!”

“You helped!”

“At least I wasn’t the one who forgot to tell Shiro about the peanut oil in the chocolate chip cookies and nearly constricted his airway and then bludgeoned him in the head with a golf club!

“That was an accident, for starters,” said Lance, “and at least I didn’t knock down the world’s largest rubber band ball!”

“You can’t knock it down! It’s a ball! It rolls!”

“It rolled right over an eighty-year-old man.”

“No, actually it rolled over his wife.” Pidge was fiddling with her ham radio setup, which she operated illegally on the go. No one knew what she was doing with all those wavy sound lines and static-y sounds emerging from her headphones. It was just what Pidge did.

“That’s hardly better,” said Lance. “You may be the resident ace pilot, but at least I’m second best at threatening the lives of the elderly.”

“Yeah?” asked Keith. “You’re awfully good at being second best.”

Hunk snapped to attention. The glint departed Lance’s eyes in an instant. “Well,” he said bitterly. “I can’t argue with you there.” He shrugged and turned, walking off into the darkness.

“Oh dear,” said Allura. “I’d better look after him if he’s going to walk off alone in the dark.” She hurried off.

“Not cool, man,” Hunk said into the awkward silence surrounding the campfire.

“I wasn’t thinking,” said Keith. “I just…fuck.”

“You really hurt his feelings with that one,” Pidge said quietly, her headphones in her hands, spitting static.

“I know,” said Keith. “Shit.” He put his head into his hands.

There was something about being on Earth that dragged Lance back into who he used to be. The inferior. The lost. The mildly spiteful. He’d almost fooled himself into believing that he was over it – that he was finally comfortable in his own skin, that he didn’t have to be the best as long as he was his best. But it wasn’t even the damage to his self esteem that really did it – it was that Keith had said it specifically to hurt. And out of nowhere. In the middle of a petty argument. That hurt more than anything.

He could hear Allura crunching leaves behind him, even though she tried to be quiet. Always looking after him. Always assuming he’d get himself into some sort of trouble. And what made him so bitter about it was the knowledge that, so often, he would.

“I’m calling it a night,” he said, changing course and heading for the camper. “You don’t have to babysit me, Allura.” He trudged back toward his cot and his thin blanket and his midseason finale of The Walking Dead. Allura touched his shoulder lightly as he passed by. He shrugged her off.

The next day, Shiro grabbed a six-pack (his secret stash), a fishing pole, and a tiny child’s beach chair decorated with clownfish, and made for the lake a half a mile away.

“You know I care about all of you,” he said, “but I’m going to go fishing. I’m going to sit in this chair, and I’ll happily skin the person who makes me move. So do what you want, but be prepared for the consequences.” He nodded resolutely and made his exit, Allura chasing after him to remind him to wear his hypoallergenic sunscreen.

Pidge turned to Lance. “I need a ride to the nearest store to get some radio stuff.”

“Okay,” he said, making for Shiro’s dad’s old pickup truck that pulled the camper.

“I need to come too,” said Keith, with heavy bags under his eyes. “I need some stuff.”

The nearest store was a WalMart twenty minutes away.

The first thing Pidge noticed was that it was nearly totally empty. There was but one cashier, and she was wall-eyed. The automatic doors creaked. The inside of the store played elevator music. “Meet back here in fifteen,” said Lance, and they wandered off in their respective directions.

Pidge wandered about the aisles looking for her extra wires and the little pencils she liked and the best instant coffee for all-nighters. Keith and Lance avoided speaking to each other except when absolutely necessary, picking out toilet paper and Cheez-Its and several pool noodles. Wrapped up in their own heads, they paid for their things and left the store, and only after the silent ride home did they notice anything was missing.

Pidge wandered out into the parking lot after finding them nowhere in the store, and swore loudly. The truck was gone.

“Hey!” called the wall-eyed cashier. “You gotta pay for that stuff!”

“Well, fuck,” Pidge said to herself.

It was in the personal care aisle that she saw him. She had downed a couple of Red Bulls at that point (okay, maybe four). So yeah, the world was starting to blur. And the aisles were starting to seem more and more like a mystical labyrinth, a trap for the weak-willed, a purgatory where one might wander for all eternity and never see the sun. Or, for that matter, a sales associate. But she swore he was real; he was not of this world, but he was real.

He seemed to distort the air around him, like he possessed a certain gravity. His eyes were in fact as bulbous and red as legend told, but he seemed to taste the air, too, with these gently waving antennae on his face. He was coated in downy gray fur. His wings were dark, iridescent, sharp like the edges of knives.

“I knew you would come,” he said to Pidge, not looking. His voice was like rocks falling off the side of a mountain.

“How’d you figure that?” she asked, rubbing her eyes and trying to remember if this had ever happened on Red Bull before.

“You signaled me,” he said. “Did you not?”

“I don’t know, maybe.” Shouldn’t have played around with amateur radio frequencies. “But is that why you’re in WalMart? Really?”

“No,” he said in his rockslide voice. “I ran out of Kraft macaroni and baby wipes.”

“Mothman eats Kraft macaroni?”

“Please,” he said. “Call me Maurice.”

“Hmm,” Pidge said. “Nice to meet you, Maurice. You’re as intimidating as they said you’d be. I’m Pidge Gunderson.”

“I am pleased to make the acquaintance of yours as well, Pigeon Dungerson,” he said.

“Well, we’ll work on that later, I guess,” she muttered. “Say, Maurice. How’d you like to help me with something?”

There were several reasons this was a good idea.

1. Revenge. She’d only been buying deodorant and stuff, for fuck’s sake. She hadn’t just wandered off for two hours. She was sick and tired of getting left places – WalMart. Diners. Gas stations.

2. Keith and Lance were at each other’s throats more than was necessary, and it was screwing with Pidge’s flow. They always worked better together in times of trouble. Perhaps it was time to shake things up.

3. It was going to be a hell of a lot of fun.

“Okay,” she said to Maurice, who was munching happily on a Pop Tart. “Here’s what we’re going to do. I need you to stick close. I’ll lure them off by themselves, and then you can do your weird stun-tongue thing and drag them around a little bit. Let them freak out. Let ‘em scream a little bit. And then when they get their shit together and figure out a plan to get out of the situation, I want you to let them get away. Let them think they’ve done it themselves. And I’ll pay you in all the Pop Tarts you want.”

“We do not have Pop Tarts in my realm,” said Maurice, the air shimmering around him.

“I know, Maurice,” said Pidge. “I know.”

Keith apologized profusely when he arrived twenty minutes later to retrieve Pidge, but strangely enough she didn’t have anything to say about being stranded at WalMart. Keith put it down to one of her weird caffeine-drunk spells, given the aroma of Red Bull on her breath. He shrugged it off.

He was lacing up his boots and packing his field notes when he noticed Lance standing by awkwardly. “What are you about to do?” he asked.

“I’m gonna look around,” Keith said, trying to offer a little goodwill. “You can come if you want.”

Pidge, behind a nearby tree (and sporting some fabulous aviators) whispered into a walkie talkie: “Your move, Maurice.”

Around one in the afternoon, Shiro was working on his sweet Chaco tan when he remembered he’d forgotten his pool noodle. He tromped right back to the camper. Allura was just out of bed, wearing a t-shirt over her swimsuit and sipping a cup of the acidic black coffee that spewed out of the ancient coffeemaker.

“What’s that on your legs?” She asked.

“What’s what?”

“That,” she said, gesturing toward a strange yellow-pink rash that Shiro had not previously noticed.

“I guess that’s…oh. Oh no.”

“What?”

“Poison ivy.”

“Isn’t that supposed to be rather mildly irritating?”

“Not to me,” Shiro said. “Guess what else I’m allergic to?”

“Poison ivy,” Allura said, turning slightly green. “Oh. Oh shit.”

“It makes me swell up like a balloon,” he said.

“I’ll get the keys,” Allura sighed. He was already looking a bit puffy.

In retrospect, Lance would wonder if it was really all that surprising that as soon as they’d wandered far enough from the campsite that no one could hear them scream, there had suddenly been an insect man tall enough to sling one of them over each shoulder and haul them back to his weird lair thing. It was, like, the only thing that hadn’t happened yet in his short life.

The cave was not littered with the bones of small animals, as he would have expected, but instead strange paraphernalia of ages past. Hawaiian shirts. A gumball machine. A broken television set. Books and books and books. Star Wars miniatures. A typewriter.

It really wasn’t a cave at all. More of a large person-sized dirt burrow, or an adobe hallway.

“This is my collection,” said the strange red-eyed moth creature. “Please making yourself comfortable.” He paused for a moment, as if contemplating. “If you can.” For Keith and Lance were bound up together, back to back, in some sort of strange tense plastic-like material. Slightly slimy. Ominous.

“Listen,” said Lance. “If you’ll just untie these rope thingies, we can all sit down and have a chat, okay? A dinner party. A forum, if you will.”

“I cannot do that,” said the creature. “Do you like music?”

“What?”

“Music.”

“I mean…yeah. I guess.”

“Oh, good,” said Mothman. He walked his funny childlike shuffling walk over to a cobwebbed corner, and fiddled with something glinting in the low light. A moment later, scratchy music began to play. Upon further inspection, the object barely visible in the dimness seemed to be a phonograph. “It is the theme from an Earth show called, ‘I Am Dreaming of Jeannie,’” he said. “I have also the songs of Billie Holliday, and Milli Vanilli, and Back of Nickel.”

“You’ve been collecting Earth music, haven’t you?” said Keith.

“They sell Nickelback on vinyl?” asked Lance.

“I have been a collector of Earth things for many years,” said the creature. “Next I will show you my collection of glass jars. Perhaps my marbles, if you are careful. Or my many plastic shopping bags. And my most favorite thing,” he said. “Would you like to see my most favorite thing?”

“I suppose,” said Lance.

“Look.” He trotted out of a corner with a dusty cardboard box that, upon further inspection, contained dusty video cassette tapes. “It is my box set of all of the seasons of the Earth show ‘Friends.’”

“Very, um, nice,” said Keith.

“We were ON A BREAK,” said Mothman. He made a noise that sounded somewhere between a cough and an avalanche. “Ha! Ha! Have I done the Earth humor correctly? I have not had much time to practice on real people.”

“You know what, buddy?” said Lance. “Yeah. You did it right. Congratulations. You’re pretty great at Earth-speak.”

“Oh,” said the Mothman, clapping his hand-things. “I am glad.”

“If you would just…y’know…untie us, that’d be great.”

“You will be going nowhere,” the creature said in his strange gravelly voice. “For I will not permit it. You are to be my dinner. Yummy yummy. Human flesh.” The moth-creature-alien-thing waved his hands about his head in a manner that resembled jazz hands. “Was I convincingly scary?”

“I’m not ready to leave anyway,” said Keith. “I want to interview him.”

Lance raised his eyes to the ceiling. “Of course,” he muttered. “Of course you do. Of course you want to interview the flesh-devouring man-moth who has us trapped prone in his cave in the Virginia wilderness.”

“I’m just saying!” said Keith. “We are never going to get this chance again! We can get documentation! Nobody has ever had proof this definitive of the existence of Mothman. We can ask him about the Silver Bridge thing –”

“That was not my doing,” said the Mothman.

“You know what I’m talking about?” asked Keith. “You know about the Silver Bridge?”

“I am Maurice,” said the Mothman. “Please refer to me by my Earth name.”

“Okay, um…Maurice, then,” said Keith. “So what really happened that day?”

“I do not know,” he said. “It was a most unfortunate accident. I was at home all day. The one they spotted was not me.”

“Who was it, then?”

“My brother Jimmy. He was visiting from our realm.”

“Your realm?”

“My home. It is in another galaxy.”

“Well, what’s it like? What are your people like?”

“They are mostly what you humans would call ‘average Joes,’” said Maurice. “They are workers. They pay taxes. I am here to work on my thesis. I have taken a bit longer than the average of forty years to complete it.”

“Your…thesis?”

“Yes,” he said. “It is on the behavior of the bald Earthlings and their strange culture. I have learned of one ritual in particular that captures my imagination. You put our your right arm, and then your left, and then you turn your hands over, and then grasping your elbows…”

“You’re speaking of the Macarena,” said Keith.

“We could demonstrate it for you if you’d untie us.”

“Oh,” he said. “I will. Eventually. But for now the little one said –” He clapped his hands over his mouth.

“What little one?” asked Keith. “Are you working for somebody?”

“I have said too much,” said Maurice. “You will have to ask her. For now I will take my leave. I have to be gathering the flowers.” He waddled out of the cave at what was top speed, compared to his usual gait. “Do not be trying to be escaping,” he called backwards over his wing.

Lance and Keith summoned grimaces and raised their hands as far as they could to wave, considering they were tied up. They didn’t stop smiling at the creature’s back until he was well out of sight.

“Okay,” said Lance when it was clear they were alone. “We’re going to have to work together to get out of this.”

“I haven’t seen Lance and Keith for a while,” said Hunk, surrounded by a stack of novels, knee-deep in one that had to be at least 500 pages. “You wouldn’t, um, happen to know anything about that, would you?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” said Pidge. “Nothing. None. Zip.”

“You were awfully intent on paying them back,” Hunk said, “and now, funnily enough, they’re gone.”

“I think I should reapply my sunscreen.”

“Pidge. Come on. Where are they?”

She sighed. “It’s kind of hard to explain. But they’re safe!” she added hastily, when Hunk turned slightly green. “Relatively, anyway.”

“Explain now,” he said, putting his chin in his hands.

“Okay,” she said, and began her sordid tale.

When she reached the end, Hunk put his face in his hands. “I cannot believe,” he said, “that you invited Mothman to kidnap your teammates.”

“Maurice,” corrected Pidge.

“Maurice may be responsible for many deaths, my friend. The Silver Bridge! Car accidents! Oh, god, they’re probably already dead! I don’t know how I’m going to explain this to Lance’s mom –”

“The collapse of the Silver Bridge was caused by a faulty eyebar and you fucking know it,” said Pidge. “Maurice is a nice guy. All he wants is Pop Tarts, I promise. And he’s probably an extremely valuable contact for Voltron, and an opportunity for insight into parts of the universe yet uncharted –”

“Take me to them,” said Hunk. “Now.”

“Ugh. Fine.”

Usually, Allura loved riding her high-tech portable deployable solar-powered motorcycle, courtesy of Coran – the wind in her hair, the sun on her face. The sweet taste of fresh rural Earth air. But right now, her hair was whipping Shiro in the face as he rode behind her, arms locked around her waist.

He was still pretty swollen and itchy, but at least he now had a prescription for some medication that was supposed to help. And at least nobody had said much about the Galra arm.

And at least, said that small, wicked part of her mind, he would still need someone to rub calamine lotion between his shoulder blades.

As a pick-me up, she’d bought him a huge tin of fudge from a roadside stand that also sold beaded bracelets, snow globes with Mickey Mouse in them (probably stolen), and little figures of tiny naked fairy babies with flower crowns and chubby cheeks.

It was this fudge tin that was digging lines into her back as she pulled up to the camp site. She parked, stood and stretched her back good and long, and then looked up as Shiro shuffled up next to her.

“Wait a minute,” she said. “Where in quiznak is everybody?”

Keith and Lance managed to accomplish approximately nothing.

Lance was proposing a strategic top-speed ground roll all the way back to the camp site when Keith, who was the one facing the mouth of the weird dirt burrow, began screaming. “Hunk! Pidge! Run while you still can! Before Mothman devours your flesh!”

“Excuse me,” said Mothman, appearing suddenly out of nowhere with a crack, antennae quivering. “But I have told you that is not my name.”

“Nice work, Maurice,” said Pidge, entering the mouth of the burrow slightly sweaty and out of breath. “It’s not your fault they were too stupid to figure out a way out.”

“Wait,” said Lance. “Hold on just a hot fuckin’ minute. You know him?”

“Yeah,” said Pidge. “You make all kinds of friends when you get stranded in WalMart.”

“You set him on us,” said Keith.

“I did you a favor,” she said, “and you would be wise to remember it the next time we stop at a QuikTrip. Before you, you know, forget me.”

“I mean,” said Hunk. “She kind of has a point.”

“The idea,” Pidge said, “was that you were supposed to figure out a way out together and realize that you’re a great team and you need to support each other.”

“So you organized this as a lesson in teamwork? You let us be kidnapped by a giant insect-man in the Virginia wilderness so we could learn?”

“No,” she said, looking at the pile of bubble-wrapped teenage boy on the ground. “That was just a bonus. This is also revenge for the five different times you’ve left me at…let’s see. Waffle House, a gas station, another gas station, that one weird fruit stand, and WalMart. But you weren’t supposed to get hurt or anything. You were supposed to figure out a way to get out. Together. Since you’ve been making our lives miserable with your fighting.”

“Well, we didn’t.”

“I am sorry I have bound you too tightly,” said Maurice. “I forgot that humans do not possess fine razor sharp hairs on their hands capable of cutting through my biological web goo.”

“Whatever you do,” said Lance, closing his eyes as if in pain. “Do not ever mention biological web goo again. And do not tell me what part of you it comes from.”

“Oh, just my nose.”

“I guess it could be worse,” said Keith.

“So you’re basically tied up in alien moth snot,” said Hunk.

“Maurice,” said Pidge. “How do you feel about Spaghetti-Os cooked over a campfire?”

“I would most enjoy it!”

“You did some nice work today, bud. I have seventeen boxes of Pop Tarts with your name on them.”

Pidge held out a fist for him to bump, but he met it with a high five. “Okay,” she said. “I guess we’ll have to work on that.”

When they got back to the camp site, Shiro was lying under a blanket inside the camper, watching Gilmore Girls season two, and Allura was already pacing with her hands on her hips, ready to scold. “Where in quiznak have you been?” she demanded in her best Mom Voice.

“Off making friends with the local cryptids,” said Pidge. “Meet my friend Maurice.”

“I am so fortunate to be included in the bald Earthling ritual burning of the marshmallows,” said Maurice.

Allura was taken aback. “Um,” she said. “I don’t believe I’ve met anyone of your species before. But I suppose it’s nice to meet you. And you,” she said to Pidge, “will explain later.”

“Oh, that is alright,” said Maurice. “I am sure we will be able to do the bonding over bald Earthling pop culture. I am rather partial to Bruno Mars myself.”

Pidge and Maurice sat around the campfire long after everyone else had retreated to the relative civilization of the RV. They toasted Pop Tarts, downed yet more Red Bull, and traded stories about their respective worlds, current events, and pop music.

“Well,” said Allura warmly, observing from afar. “I think everything’s finally all worked out. We’re bonding, we’re learning about each other, we’re exploring the great American wilds, we found Mothman…”

“Oh fuck,” said Shiro. “I think this fudge has nuts in it.”

“Oh no,” said Allura. “Oh, no. Oh no no no. How allergic did you say you were to nuts?”

“Severely,” said Shiro.

“NURSE HUNK! EPI-PEN! NOW!”

As Hunk thundered around the camp looking for the first aid kit, and Pidge continued teaching Maurice bawdy British rugby songs, and as Allura issued commands while Shiro panicked (“My face is swelling! I can’t feel my face!”), Lance turned to Keith. “So,” he said. “Is Mothman everything you hoped he would be?”

“I mean,” said Keith, shrugging. “He’s a little anticlimactic. I don’t know how I’m supposed to work this into a book about the dark underbelly of Mother Nature. And besides, I didn’t find him. Pidge did.��

“Pidge always figures everything out first,” huffed Lance. “Sometimes I wonder why I bother comparing myself to you when she smokes us both.”

Keith hung his head. “I’m sorry I said that stuff before, about you being second best,” he said. “I don’t really think that. I was just being an ass.”

“Oh, it’s alright,” said Lance. “I’m used to you being an ass.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not trying to be,” he replied. “I just am that way. Even when I’m thinking totally chill, benign thoughts, I somehow manage to bitch people out. I don’t really like that about myself. Actually,” he said, “sometimes I’m not sure I like myself much at all.”

“Yeah, well, then we make a great team,” said Lance.

“We do, though,” said Keith.

“Would you like yourself more if you managed to solve Bigfoot first? I know Mothman’s out of the game, but other mysteries remain. I’ll come with you, of course.”

“Well, duh. I’ll need witnesses and a cameraman and stuff.”

“I still can’t feel my face!” Shiro yelled in the distance.

“No, no,” said Pidge to Maurice. “You’re talking about rugby league. It’s different from rugby union.”

“This fudge really is exceptional, though,” said Allura.

“Pound it,” said Lance, offering a fist. Keith met it with a high five.

“Okay,” said Lance. “We can work on that.”

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fashiontrendin-blog · 6 years

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The Dark Side of Viral Stories Meant to “Restore Your Faith in Humanity”

https://fashion-trendin.com/the-dark-side-of-viral-stories-meant-to-restore-your-faith-in-humanity/

The Dark Side of Viral Stories Meant to “Restore Your Faith in Humanity”

rom the dancing Eid boy, to photos documenting the growth of Fiona the hippo, to dogs rejoicing at their owners returning from war, wholesome memes are supposed to be a source of guilt-free pleasure. It makes sense that your average social media user would develop an appetite for “pure” content in the era of multi-level irony, fake news and alt-right trolling; it’s a pleasant palette-cleanser. And it can feel inspiring to read that specific genre of viral news story in which people overcome extraordinary odds or extend random acts of kindness to their fellow human beings. (Eli Pariser built an entire business model around demand for this content when he founded Upworthy.)

Like many others, I was moved by the recent story of Tasia, the Walmart cashier who took time out of her lunch break to give Angela, a wheelchair user with cerebral palsy, a manicure after she was turned away from a nail bar. It was an act of unsolicited kindness that granted a woman the dignity she deserved — but it was one fueled by injustice on the part of a world that likely has and will continue to exclude Angela on the grounds of her ability. Tasia rightfully called out Da Vi Nails in a Facebook post for denying Angela service, asserting that she has the right to the same beauty treatments and pampering experiences as everybody else, especially considering disabled people spend so much of their lives being infantilized or dehumanised.

Tasia and Angela’s story is just one example of a wider trend. Look closely at the touching true life stories which spread across social media and you’ll find that, while they are presented as positive, they actually reveal some pretty ugly truths. Take the video of the Alabama teacher who cried tears of joy when she was gifted a car by the mother of one of her students after years of taking the bus to work. Courtney Adelaye, the parent in question, is the CEO of a successful hair care product company. Of all the coverage of this story online, few outlets if any addressed the fact that teachers are grossly underpaid, and not all of them are lucky enough to have the child of a generous business owner in their class.

Then there is the story of Walter Carr, who walked for almost 20 miles to his first day of work at a moving company, embarking on the eight-hour journey at midnight, walking beside busy highways and encountering stray dogs along the way. He was aided by police officers who drove him some of the way and was, in the end, rewarded with a car. Jenny Lamey, the customer whose house he walked all night to reach, started a GoFundMe to help Carr with his transport troubles, and raised more than $44,000. Of his ordeal, she said: “I think God helped him through.” It is far more likely he was motivated by sheer economic desperation.

It is understandable that The Washington Post and other news outlets would latch onto Carr’s extraordinary story, but it is also necessary to examine the structural problems that forced him to take such drastic action, including a lack of public transportation and a dearth of jobs with sufficient pay in his local area. We’re applauding the generosity and self-sacrifice of ordinary people like Lamey and Adelaye instead of holding the institutions at fault accountable.

Another warm-and-fuzzy news story details how a pregnant woman was “very humbled” when her co-workers donated their vacation days so she could spend more time with her new baby. The federal government gives workers the option to voluntarily transfer their paid leave days to another person — a particularly precious baby shower gift, considering the average worker in the U.S. can only expect ten days of paid leave per year, and maternity leave is not mandated. As an outsider, this is bizarre to me. Here in the UK, 28 days of paid leave per year is considered the baseline, and maternity pay is a statutory right.

What many of these “heartwarming” tales have in common is a working culture which places inordinate pressure on individuals

What many of these “heartwarming” tales have in common is a working culture which places inordinate pressure on individuals, coupled with a failure on the part of organizations to pay a living wage and offer sufficient parental or sick leave (not to mention a broader lack of transport infrastructure) which make it essentially impossible for workers to meet these demands without the assistance of a benevolent interloper.

According to Esquire’s Joanna Rothkopf, we love these viral moments because “they’re rare stories of compassion—because we see someone crying with joy, for once, and we cry, too… But they’re also inherently stories of a collective failure to make sure Americans have easy access to transportation and healthcare and maternity leave. They’re stories of how we neglect, and then happily weep when that neglect is temporarily sated.”

Another heartstring-tugging sub-genre of this phenomenon involves communities coming together to crowdfund an individual’s healthcare bill. This was touched on in an episode of Queer Eye’s second season; makeover recipient Skyler Jay, a trans man, had successfully crowdfunded his top surgery but still owed thousands of dollars in additional unexpected medical bills. This was swiftly glossed over in the episode, perhaps unsurprisingly; Queer Eye is wonderful in its focus on empathy and human connection, but it is also essentially a reality show about consumerism-as-self-care, and acknowledging that Skyler’s life remained full of financial obstacles at the end of the week-long shoot would have made for a less tidy, TV-friendly narrative.

Again, as somebody who is fortunate enough to live in a country with a National Health Service (albeit one which is woefully under-resourced by our own government), it makes me uncomfortable to think of somebody’s access to healthcare depending on the efficacy of their GoFundMe campaign, with the burden falling to marginalized people to prove that they are “worthy” of strangers’ generosity.

It’s understandable to seek out the positive in a negative situation, but to go “aww” at random acts of kindness without remaining critical of the social problems which necessitate them is to be willfully naïve. When a media outlet catches wind of a noble oppressed person being rewarded for their hardship, it will likely skew the story in the manner most likely to evoke an emotional response and therefore make it more shareable. I worry that the popularity of poverty-related stories which have been repackaged as fluffy human-interest pieces is damaging our collective ability to discern propaganda from real news in our feeds.

The government can feel free to make all the funding cuts it wants if there is a popular delusion that good old regular folks will step in to pick up the slack.

This trend also helps to perpetuate disturbing new social norms, such as relying on the kindness of strangers in lieu of any institutional support. The government can feel free to make all the funding cuts it wants if there is a popular delusion that good old regular folks will step in to pick up the slack. No need to invest in transportation infrastructure when workers can just walk 20 miles to “earn” a car — and why would you want socialized medicine when you can just ask random people online to cough up the money you need to cover exorbitant healthcare expenses?

When media outlets give these people the puff-piece treatment, they often fail to illuminate that such instances represent the tip of the poverty iceberg. What if you don’t have the kind of inspirational story that would make a great Hallmark Channel movie? What if you’re just one of the many ordinary people out there who’s struggling to make ends meet every single day without the help of a generous fundraising campaign? For every Walter Carr, there are countless people whose toil and suffering doesn’t go viral, who aren’t rewarded with a new car or financial assistance.

Today, as I write this, media outlets are praising school employees for donating their sick days so that a teacher who is battling cancer can attend chemotherapy. The story is getting the usual comments like “this just restored my faith in humanity” and “people are awesome.” And it’s true; every time an ordinary person goes above and beyond to help somebody else, it is worth commending. But they shouldn’t have to. We can’t rely on chance encounters or altruistic co-workers to help us work around fundamental institutional problems. We need solutions, not Band-Aids with smiley face on them.

Philip Ellis is a freelance writer and journalist from the U.K. You can follow him on Twitter @Philip_Ellis

Photo by Susan Wood via Getty Images.

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sending-the-message · 7 years

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Don't Go into Stores with a Name You Never Heard of by Hayong

My name is Anthony Stephens and I live in the small town of Granites Valley. Some maps have our town, but that may just be the ones from our town. I have looked up my town on Google as well as other search engines, but we are nowhere to be found. Basically, we are about 65 miles from Nashville and about 90 miles from Clarksville, Tennessee. When we need to get anything we will usually go to the Walmart in Nashville. If we forgot anything during our weekly trip we would have to suck it up and remember to get it the next week. Luckily, our town finally welcomed in its first “superstore”.

The new store finally opened its doors for the first time yesterday, and I was completely excited. Yes, I may be a 17-year-old boy, but this was the biggest thing that has happened in our small town. Of course, a lot of the people that lived here wondered why we were even getting such a big store in our town that barely had 500 people, but none of us complained. This store would save all of us a 65-mile drive to get anything that our local businesses didn’t have.

It was called Janus' Paradise, and on the day of its opening, the entire town rushed into the open doors. Hell, the school day was canceled so that the teachers and principal could check out the store as well. I was amongst the first to step on the cool white linoleum floors, feel the cold air from the air condition, and see the smiling faces of the employees as they greeted every single one of us. My mother and father were with me, but I walked off on my own and told them that I would meet them back at home.

I had saved up a little over $2,000 dollars over the course of six months from my part-time job at the local bakery and doing odd jobs for a couple of my neighbors. My plan was to get a new laptop as well as a couple new shirts and pants. I was starting college this year and I wanted to make sure I had everything I needed.

For about 2 hours I just walked around the store and looked at everything they had. They had everything you could possibly need. Half of the store was completely white except for the products while the other side of the store was completely black. It made me a little uncomfortable for the first couple of seconds, but I quickly started to appreciate it. I really loved everything about the store, but there was one thing that really bothered me. The logo that was almost on every single sales tag. It was a cartoon of a man’s face looking off to the side, but it had an identical face on the other side of its head. Written on the bottom of the photo was, “Janus Agrees That This is a Great Deal!” I know about Greek mythology and of Janus. That wasn’t what bugged me. It was the faces each side was making. One side had a tear drop running down its face while the other side had small wrinkles on the side of its eye and the lip was curved up to resemble a smile.

When I got to the back of the store I found the electronics section. I started to look through the laptops until one caught my eye. It was only 700 dollars and had every spec I was looking for. I looked around the section and tried to find a salesman. After waiting for a couple of minutes I started to look around and finally found one of the employees leaning up against the tablet section. He looked exhausted, but I was starting to get tired of being at the store so I walked up to him and told him I wanted to buy a laptop. A couple of awkward seconds later, he looked up at me and gave me a small smile before saying, “Sure. Do you feel like Janus thinks it’s a good idea you buy the laptop? I mean it is your choice, but is it the right choice?” With a fake smile back, I said, “Well. It is my choice right? I like the laptop and I’m fairly confident it’s the right choice.” The salesman gave me a nod and walked with me to the laptop section. I showed him the laptop and he started towards a door in the back. As he walked away I heard him quietly mutter to himself, “If it is not the right choice I pray that Janus goes easily on you.”

The salesman took around 20 minutes to finally walk out of the back door with my new laptop in his hands. He pointed to the front of the store and said he had to personally give it to the cashier. I followed closely behind him and almost ran into him when he abruptly stopped, turned around, and put his arm on my shoulder before saying, “Oh good news for you. The manager says he wants to give you a special discount since you’re a student! Follow me. I will take you to him!” I tried to tell him I didn’t really need a discount, but he grabbed me by my arm and forced me to follow him.

I didn’t want to make a scene so I let him lead me to the same door he went through to get my laptop. When I walked through the door, the salesman roughly pushed me further into the room before running out the door and slamming the door behind me.

It was completely dark. I could hear the faint sound of someone sobbing in the distance. Scared and helpless, I put my hands up and finally found the door I walked through. I grabbed the handle and tried opening the door but it wouldn’t budge. With clenched fists, I started to beat on the door while screaming for help, but no matter how long or how loud I screamed and punched the door nobody opened the door for me.

Defeated, I slid down to the floor and tried thinking of a way to get out. In the middle of my thoughts, someone said to me, “You have two choices right now. You grab the gun that is right next to you and shoot yourself or you stand back up and turn on the light. The switch is right next to the door handle.”

I felt around me and grabbed the gun and put it in my pocket before getting up and felt around for the light switch. When I found the switch I took a deep breath and closed my eyes before turning the light on. Light flooded through my eyelids and into my eyes. I slowly opened my eyes and saw a man standing in the middle of the room. He looked like the most confident person in the world. He was in his early 20’s and had a face that could instantly swoon anyone. With a small chuckle he looked up at me and said, “Wrong choice. Just like your laptop. Wrong choice.” The sound of sobbing came from him, but he was still smiling. Confused and scared shitless, I grabbed the gun and without a second thought pointed it at the man and shot in his direction. I didn’t stop until the magazine ran out of bullets.

“You keep making the wrong choice, but through wrong choices, you are given an opportunity to make your greatest choi-” The sentence was cut off by the sound of sobbing. I looked up and saw him still standing, but he looked completely different. His face was full of wrinkles and looked to be someone that has completely given up on life. He fell to his knees and put his face on his knees to fall into a deep sob, but instead of starting to feel bad my throat completely closed up and I fell down on the ground and crawled towards the door.

As one face sobbed his other face made another appearance and he was still smiling at me while mouthing out, “Make a choice.”

With panic apparent in my voice I blurted out, “What the fuck are you? Janus?” The sobbing face looked back up at me and sighed before it turned its head to the other side. With the same confident voice it spoke to me earlier it said, “No. You think I’m some Greek god? Fuck no. Foolish. You’re foolish. No, 2 days ago, I was a stupid kid like you. I made the wrong choice and ignored the salesman. I was certain my choice was right, but just like you, I insulted Janus. Don’t worry. Just like me, you have two choices. You can either choose to die or you can choose to give your life to Janus. If you choose to give your life to Janus you will be given a store, immortality, and a little bit of Janus will go into your soul.” He softly stroked the other face with his fingers.

It’s the morning now. I know my life is no longer completely mine, but I wasn’t ready to die. As I write to you guys I hear the same sobbing I heard yesterday coming from behind me. With a sigh, I comfort the other face while I give you guys a warning. If you live in a small town, don’t go into Janus’ Paradise. If you do, please listen to the salesman. They know what Janus approves of as a good choice.

My name is Anthony Stephens, and I am now moving to a small town in Tennessee called Plantation Estates.

#reddit #nosleep #scary #story

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aquabettacichlid-blog · 7 years

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Hiatus: EXPLAINED!

Aren't you just so excited? Reasons!

I have been disgustingly busy the last 5 months. A lot has happened and a lot will be happening! So, here goes.

Around the time of my last post (early-mid November) Justin and I decided to get married. We called some people and made some arrangements started planning out our last minute wedding. It was wonderful and being able to have our families there made everything incredibly worth it. We got married December 30th, 2016! (So, 2016 wasn't a complete failure of a year.)

Right before we left to go to Indy to get married (Mid-December) our power went out. We had a leak in our filter we didn’t know about, so, Justin woke up to go to the bathroom and was greeted by a half empty 125g fish tank. We had about 70 gallons of water on the floor and some very cold fish. We spent an entire weekend and then 4 more days with the air conditioning on cleaning up and drying the carpet. (It was very cold in our apartment for about 2 weeks.)

There were INNUMERABLE problems while we were in Indy planning out the final details of our wedding. Huge problems and little problems. Everywhere.

Pretty much right after we got married we got a puppy. We thought she was a German Shepherd puppy but thats a story for another time.

Charlie. She is a Shetland Sheepdog/German Shepherd mix, so she's pretty small. But also REALLY great <3

Two days before we left for VA, we tried to start the Malibu (my old car) and the engine spluttered and died. This was a huge problem seeing as Justin has to be back in Norfolk when his leave ends <Or Else>. We thought maybe the battery was dead, so we went to Advance to get a new battery, got back home, hooked up the battery and... nothing. *splutter. struggle. die.* So we troubleshooted some more and thought maybe it was the starter, so we ordered a starter and picked it up the next day (cutting it WAY too close for NavyBoy) and it didn’t work either. We called my uncle and he rushed over and we found out that the engine had seized and cracked because of the cold weather. SO, we were out a vehicle. My uncle happened to have an extra vehicle on hand and he let us borrow it. SO, we drove a 1997 Toyota RAV4 with 350,000 miles on it home to VA from Indiana. When we got into Richmond there was ice in sheets 6 inches thick on the road. That continued all the way into VA Beach. The RAV handled beautifully and I'm not sure my Malibu would have made it into our parking lot, let alone through the ice covered highways.

As if not having our own vehicle, puppy training and settling back into our apartment and putting things back in order wasn't enough of a job for us, the same week I had to be taken to the emergency room. I was in an unbearable amount of pain. I called my entire family trying to avoid going there but they all said that abdominal pain this bad couldn't be ignored. So, off we went. We were there FOREVER. After a very rude nurse and a butt-load of tests they concluded that I had ruptured an ovarian cyst (when this was found out the nurse softened considerably.) I was basically on “LLD” until further notice. They prescribed some SUPER drugs (ibuprofen and tylenol -_-).

About 2 days after this happened we went to talk to our apartment complex. We had been planning to move into a bigger apartment for a while and having Charlie made it more immediate. We had noticed that the 2 bedroom across the hall was empty and the carpet had JUST been replaced (#nosey). We asked about it and they were very eager to help and let us move into the apartment across the hall but there was a catch. They needed us to move in over the weekend. That gave us 3 days to move into the new apartment. I was on strict orders to not lift things so, I organized and moved most of the kitchen but Justin was the real hero here; moving everything that weighed more than 5lbs (Including our 125g fish tank) by himself.

Not long after we moved into the new apartment, we decided we needed a shelf. I believe it was a Sunday. We went outside and our RAV was gone. Justin hadn't moved it since Friday when he parked it after work. It turns out someone had bought the spot our RAV was parked in and the night before the apartment people painted numbers on that spot. We had been towed. We didn’t have any money because we had just used the last of it to pay the difference in our rent for the month, so, we had to borrow money from my parents to get it out the same day, but because it was Sunday we had to do a money order at Walmart. We had to call one of Justin’s friends and she lugged us all over creation (THANK YOU CHAR ILY) to get our car back. The towing place wouldn’t let us just come pick it up with the key. We had to call my uncle and have him send “official documents” saying that we had permission to use the vehicle and that Justin was on the insurance. (Which is ripe bullshit). Finally we got the RAV back and all was well.

We were finally able to get back into the fish tanks again a couple weeks ago. We ran to Petsmart to get a stand for our 36g bow front tank. Justin had found the stand online for $60 so we were going to price match it. When we got there they had 75g set ups and we remembered that we had found a deal online for a 75g Marineland set (tank, lids, stand and lights) for $98. We couldn't find the deal online so we searched our phones and found a screenshot that I had sent Justin the week before. Our local Petsmart price matched it for us and then our cashier told us about a coupon we could get on our phones for 25% off our purchase. We ended up getting a brand new 75g tank set for a little more than a dollar a gallon ($79).