#i just refuse to believe my mans is the least popular bias like how he’s the definition of perfect | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

honeytea8 · 4 years

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✨✨La Squadra Boyfriend Headcanons✨✨

[Alexa, play Boyfriend by Big Time Rush]

Guys, I spend an ungodly amount of time thinking about La Squadra, so here are some bf headcanons for the sexiest group of assassins in Naples. No one asked but I am bringing it straight to your dash anyway! (under the cut for length lmao)

I’m going to start with Prosciutto, who has recently fallen on my radar pretty heavy!

He’s a good and decent boyfriend, if not a busy one. Not that he doesn’t care about the relationship, but most of his energy was going to Passione things before you waltzed in and so he’ll struggle a bit between his work responsibilities and maintaining his relationship with you, but only in the beginning.

If you are also a part of Passione, it’s a hell of a lot easier to manage.

I see Prosciutto as the gift-giving type: lingerie, sweets, perfume, designers, etc. His salary isn’t the best, but he manages it as well as he can just to accommodate you!

I just can’t get the idea out of my head that Pro was raised by a strict mama, that’s why he can be a bit of a stickler sometimes. He’ll catch you still lounging in bed at nine am, and be like “Why are you still in bed? Get dressed, we’re going out.” Dude!

I’m sorry to say, but Prosciutto is absolutely the ‘lecturing’ type. (He lectured someone in nearly every scene in the anime, Formaggio once and Pesci numerously and Bucci too)

He will lecture you when you make mistakes, especially because as his s/o, he has high expectations for you and believes you’re capable of so much more. It’s never, ever out of hate. He loves you, and that’s why he chides you a bit lol.

This does not negate the fact that he doesn't mind when you lean on him for support. He likes when you count on him, because he always comes through especially for you!

Depending on whether you’re in the mafia or not, I totally see him sparring with you, or working out with you in an effort to make you tough. Prosciutto wants you to be able to defend yourself, just in case. If you complain, he’ll tell you, “Better safe than sorry, tesoro”.

Prosciutto will respect you, period.

A good listener, goddamn! He’s up there with Risotto when it comes to who listens to their s/o more! If you have an issue, he’ll hear you out and offer advice if you want it. If you give him advice, he’ll take it into serious consideration. He’s honestly a good partner, can’t stress that enough.

Finally, sex with Pro is an entire event. Romantic dinner, candles lit, wine, the whole nine yards before he gives you nine inches of something else :) (I’m kidding!! Lmao, kinda).

But as I said, Prosciutto is quite deliberate, and a bit of a perfectionist. He knows what to do and how to do it, you can trust him.

Ghiaccio is next only because he’s my favorite.

The ice gremlin is probably the most interesting (and hilarious) boyfriend out of the bunch (I say this with only a tidbit of bias). He isn’t funny himself, but funny shit just happens to him.

Because of this, he will use you as a soundboard when everyone else refuses to listen to him. He’s got a lot to say, so be prepared for his TEDtalks. LMAO!

It will take some perception on your part to notice when he actually expects a response from you, and other times he’s just ranting to get his point out.

He will correct your grammar when you text, but barely notices when he makes a similar mistake (his brain moves in mph). Please use the proper names like Venezia, Italia, Roma and Napoli when talking to this man; save yourself from the headache.

When it comes to dates, please have mercy on him, he’s a textbook over-thinker! You’ll just have to plan something simple at home for you both to enjoy.

He isn’t incapable of planning dates, but he’ll want everything to be so absolutely perfect for his s/o and will throw a fit when it ultimately isn’t.

Contrary to popular belief, I think that Ghiaccio is a pretty attentive partner. He’s super intelligent and I think a part of it stems from his innate ability to read people (I’m referencing the part in the anime where he deduced what Giorno and Mista had come to look for, while going off very little information).

The more time he spends with you, the better he gets at it.

His form of affection will be shown through the amount of time you both spend together. When it comes to sex or anything related to that, be gentle and slow as Ghiaccio will likely be a flustered mess.

As he becomes more comfortable and confident, he will be bolder and just ask out right if you’ll suck him off tonight or not. The man appreciates directness, so don’t bother being coy. “You want me to give you head? Cool, lay down a towel or something.” is what he’ll probably say.

Very practical 👌🏾👌🏾

Melone, good lord, he’s kind of perfect.

A bit of a doting boyfriend here and there—very much concerned about your health. Expect him to ask if you’ve eaten, or taken your multivitamin. How are your bowel movements? LMAO

It can become a bit much, but he really genuinely cares. He’s not asking to be intrusive or nasty! If he was, you’d know. 🤣

But I seriously consider Melone to be the one (at least among La Squadra) who is way, way invested in his relationships. He will know every little detail about you; will ask you lots of questions and expects you to ask him just as many.

This may be annoying to some, but this dude will definitely bring up your horoscope in an argument. He’ll be like “I honestly can’t fathom why you’re being this way, though it’s to be expected from a libra.”

Peg this bitch so he can shut up.

Melone is also touchy as hell, but not in a clingy way. He loves touching, and just to tag onto the headcanon about his partial blindness, I want to say that he’s so touchy because that’s how he ‘sees’ you best.

Just know that half the time, he isn’t touching you to be lecherous, even if he genuinely does like the feel of your skin under his fingertips. Melone will even encourage you to touch him back.

Rub his thigh or back and he’ll be simping.

He is obsessed with your legs, and will paint your toes if you let him.

LOVES PDA! Melone will also tongue-kiss you in public if you let him!

Notice how I keep saying ‘if you let him’. Give him an inch and he’ll press you for a mile, so if there are boundaries you would like to establish, please do, cuz he sure as hell won’t, just saying!

When it comes to sex, Melone is a dick and coochie sensei. Oral is his favorite thing to do, probably enjoys giving more than receiving to be honest. I’d say he’s pretty much mastered sex for what it is.

That being said, if he’s ever talking out of his neck, just invite him to put his mouth to better use. He’ll even thank you for your gracious request.

Formaggio is next 💀

According to my JoJo compatriots from discord, he’s like the Optimus Prime of fuckboi’s so let’s ride that wave for a bit! LMAO

I hope it doesn’t come as a surprise that Formaggio is pretty shameless. He will send you a dick pic on Sunday morning before church and have the audacity to say “Just wanted to bless you real quick”.

@autumn-kouhai mentioned him giving his s/o sickly sweet pet names and I just have to agree.

Expect to be hit upside the head with: baby-boo, sugar plum, honey bunches, sweetums. I can imagine them becoming really ridiculous too like “the last piece of red velvet cake” or “cheddar bae biscuits from Red Lobster”

His catch phrase is “Got nudes?”

Send them, and he won’t be afraid to reply with something equally sexy.

Be warned though, he will stockpile whatever you send him and then be careless with his phone. If you don’t mind Illuso’s snoopy ass seeing your nudes then by all means, have at it. Otherwise, send them through snapchat, so they disappear later.

As far as La Squadra boyfriends go, he’s the most fun! Y’all don’t even go anywhere because man’s is broke. BUT, Formaggio knows how to have a good time without any need to spend money (my kind of dude tbh) you guys just crank up the tunes, dance, and get lit until the neighbors complain.

Formi is also the CEO of jokes/memes, and will have you in absolute tears almost always! I literally tell my friends that funny guys are so dangerous, don’t sleep on them! They will make you laugh until your panties drop, it’s magic, I swear. Formaggio has that same energy.

No matter how bad of a day his s/o is having, rest assured, he will draw the biggest laugh out of you.

Besides his fuckboi tendencies, his most redeeming quality is the fact that he’s super cool and fun to hang with. You’ll literally have a good time, always, because his energy is right! Very good vibes around this man, I swear! It’ll be exactly like dating your best friend, because essentially, he will be your bestie.

Formi has many moments of tenderness that aren’t sexually charged too—moments where the jokes stop and he’ll just rub your back or feet, this is usually when you aren’t feeling well and need some quiet.

However, Formaggio won’t let you mope all day, he’ll pull out the big guns and call you his “sweetie baby” and when you try to resist he’ll say “What, I’m just tryna show you some love.”

He’s a good dude lmao I’d date a guy like him irl 😭

Pesci stans wya??! Let’s get into this baby boy.

Pesci is boyfriend material, idgaf what anyone says.

He is pretty much the least problematic to be with among all of La Squadra, even more so than Risotto (don’t argue with me).

Pesci is hyper aware of your likes and dislikes and will literally go out of his way to make sure that you’re well and okay.

Arguments are basically nonexistent and if they occur it ain’t coming from his side.

I also think that Pesci has a lot of empathy, so when you’re going through something, he’s right there in the thick of it with you. If you’ve seen that meme that goes ‘when my gf is on her period it’s UterUS’ lmao that’s Pesci’s energy 100%.

Sometimes, he’s more of a lover and not a fight, that is perfectly okay!

However, if someone tries up his s/o, say farewell to Mr. Niceguy. He will defend your honor to his dying breath. And with you in his corner, trust me, he’s not going down.

A romantic at heart, Pesci will plan little date trips like picnics in the park or boat trips to Capri, actually, I’d like to point out that he excels in the art of date planning. If you’re the adventurous type, he’ll plan outings where you both will be more active, like biking through the city or renting a mop-ed and going sight-seeing.

Because Pesci has a sensitive stomach, he’s very much considerate of what you both put in your bodies. If you have dietary restrictions or allergies, this guy knows all about it and will cater to you perfectly.

A true gentleman through and through, he will never force himself on you, ever. In fact, he really doesn’t like engaging in anything sexual when you’re drunk or high, sorry if you’re into that!

Pesci is the kind of guy who keeps up with your favorite shows.

If ya’ll have similar taste in media or literature, he will immerse himself in it so that he can relate to you all the more.

If there’s anyone who will entertain anime-related discourse, no matter how nonsensical, it’s Pesci. And he isn’t just putting up with it, he’s actively engaging in the conversation so you are always heard and validated.

He’s an A+ boyfriend, that’s all I gotta say! Haters can stay mad :)

Goddamn Illuso... idk man.

I really feel like you have to have thick/tough skin to handle this guy, for various reasons.

The first being that Illuso can be a bit mean at first. He’ll push your buttons on purpose just to see what’ll make you tick. Will tease the living heck out of you, always, kind of a bully lmao but not to the extreme, it’s just his brand of humor—and the thing is, he won’t be mad when you dish it right back, so it’s cool.

Secondly, Illuso has big dick energy!!

I mean rightfully so, because he is indeed packing! But my word, he ain’t humble about it at all!

He is not above making jokes about ‘splitting you in half’. In fact all of his jokes have hidden, dirty undertones!

His affection is shown through speech mostly. Illuso will drop subtle innuendos and provocations, half to see you flustered and half because he wants you to know how much he wants you.

Illuso isn’t incredibly vocal about his feelings outside of ‘I’m tryna hit that thang’ but you won’t doubt that he loves you because Illuso doesn’t waste his own time.

If he’s spending his time with you, you can rest assured that it’s because he wants to.

Illuso is a voyeur and you’ll just have to understand/accept that and move on.

He loves watching you and will even creep over to your place through the mirror world just to hang or watch you do chores. Loves to surprise you and give you jump scares lmao it’ll make you a tad paranoid but it’s also fun.

Illuso is prone to random bouts of sweetness; it’s very sporadic, very touch-and-go.

One day, you’ll wake up to chocolates on your dresser or new shoes, lingerie, or makeup if you wear it. I imagine that if you’re low on funds, he will even help you buy your groceries that week.

It’ll surprise the hell out of you, but that’s just how Illuso is. He enjoys keeping you on your toes!

He’s prideful and smug as hell, so he will definitely expect a thank you, because even if he does it out of the kindness in his heart, he also wants to hear that you appreciate him

Same goes for the bedroom scene. Illuso loves making you vocal, it’s his favorite thing in the world, so he’ll make a game out of doing the things that get the biggest reaction out of you. Like I said, it's that big dick energy at work here, smh.

Sorbet and Gelato in a polyamorous relationship with you? Let’s get it!

We don’t get anything substantial about these two except that Sorbet follows the money, so these are all personal headcanons for how I see and write them.

Here’s the juice: when it comes to you as their s/o, these two are possessive as hell. You are theirs and that’s that on that! 😭 Don’t ask questions, just go with it.

Sorbet is the chill one of the duo. He can be a bit smug at times, but he’s mostly a laid back dude who doesn’t get bothered by much.

When it comes to you, Sorbet likes to spend quality time with you more than anything, and will ask you to cook for him at your place so he ain’t gotta spend money. Oh? Did I not mention that I kinda think of him as a cheapskate? Lmao cuz I do.

Sorbet will come by your place just to steal your coupons from the mail then head out; you’re not using ‘em so why should he let them go to waste?

Gelato is the complete opposite; personality wise, I headcanon him as a mix between Melone and Formaggio lmao

But it’s not as crazy as it sounds, he’s cute and outspoken like Melone, while maintaining a free-spirit like Formaggio. One quality that I like is that he’s quite devoted to you and Sorbet. If anyone crosses either of you, goodluck to them!

I like to think Gelato’s also just really boujee and high maintenance. He loves to pamper and be pampered. You and him tag-team Sorbet’s wallet and go on spa dates together at his expense (not that he ever really stood a chance)

While Sorbet is cool with just being in the same room as you, Gelato loves hugging/cuddling with you and Sorbet—will definitely fight for the middle spot between the two of you on the couch during movie nights.

He baby, so let him have it lol

In the bedroom, I would salute anyone with the guts to take the two of them on. They both lay down that work, period.

Sorbet gets his kicks from teasing and edging you (his sadistic side comes out a bit), while Gelato loves when you give him extra TLC. To put it short, they know how to take care of you, so there are no issues there.

Last but not least, Mr. Risotto Nero himself.

Man, idc on the lowest of keys, he seems a little bit like a grandpa to me

The type to sit at home and do crosswords, has a bird feeder in his yard and plays old Italian hits while washing the dishes. It’s very domestic 💀 (I find it cute, whatever!)

As a boyfriend, I can’t imagine him suddenly being spontaneous or outgoing unless you drag him out of his home/comfort zone.

Be patient with Mr. Nero, and he can come to surprise you

After a while, it won’t be just you dragging him out and about; one day he’ll ask you to come over and you’ll be greeted with a nice, traditional, homemade meal

Pay attention and you will notice him watching your face to see if you like his cooking 🥺

After seeing his fight with Doppio, I must admit that Risotto is very, very observant, almost scarily so.

I can totally picture him pointing out random things about his s/o that even they don’t know

One night, Risotto may come up to you and say “I talked to your neighbor about the dog, they’ll keep it inside now.” And you’re just staring like 😳 how did he know the barking was keeping you up at night????

He’s sweet, and will take good care of you as a boyfriend should.

Very good listener, won’t talk as much but will hang on to your every word, I promise. He could even recite it to you verbatim.

He’s a big dude, that ain’t news, so expect to be swallowed up in hugs and sometimes even picked up (as a tall girl myself, I simp!!!)

Gives A1 piggyback rides, lol

ALSO RISOTTO IS HUMBLE ASF!

Big dick energy, but on low volume 👏🏾 after all, he doesn’t need to do much talking, because a night with him is more than enough!

Listen babe, you better stretch, do some squats, and prep in whatever way you can before Mr. Nero gives you that work. 🤐

Lowkey a freak, but it’s well hidden behind his ‘quiet giant’ exterior

So, who are y'all dating? Personally, I’m going for Formaggio and Pesci hehe

#jojo #jojo’s bizarre adventure #vento aureo #la squadra #prosciutto #illuso #formaggio #melone #risotto nero #pesci #ghiaccio #gelato and sorbet #la squadra esecuzioni #la squadra di esecuzione #jojo headcanons #la squadra x reader #jojo part 5

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indieks · 6 years

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Silent Treatment 🔇 Mark Tuan || Part.1

💭 Pairing : Mark Tuan x Reader

💭 Genre : Angst, Fluff, Supernatural-ish

💭 Word count : 11k.

💭 Synopsis : Ever since his accident, he has forbidden himself from speaking ever again, as his voice hasn’t been useful the time he had needed it the most. Until he meets you, the one and only girl that could possibly help him overcome his trauma, as you make his heart and mind want to speak up again. You, who can hear his deepest thoughts through your special ability, yet still doesn’t see him as a desperate mute, but a mysterious man worthy of your care.

💭 Notice : The sentences written in bold are Mark's thoughts, and when *written like this between stars*, it means the character can hear them.

Part 01 🔇 Part 02 🔈 Part 03 🔉 Part 04 [END] 🔊

💭 A/N : I’m back!!!! Finally, I’m writing for GOT7, I’m so happy! This time, it’s a short series (normally 3 parts) that came up into my mind a long time ago but without the knowledge of where to take it nor who to choose… Until I finally opened my eyes on my own bias that suited the story too damn well, and helped it growing on its own…

I just wanted to add that I would never pretend that I know about psychology and how to treat patients! Everything comes out of my pure imagination! And please, if you ever feel bad for any reason, reach out, you matter! ♥

Thanks for ever reading this! As usual, I hope you’ll like it, and any comments, good or bad, are welcomed! I love your feedback ♥

Disclaimer : For the first time in my life, I can proudly say that the GIF is mine!

The young man was sitting lazily on the leather couch, his eyes deprived from any light or life, with his fingers gently scratching the damaged pieces of fabric that were soon going to fall to the ground.

"Hmmm I see..." the psychiatrist mumbled as he wrote down some key words on the blank sheet in front of him. "He still doesn't want to speak?"

"No, doctor. I've tried everything I could. When I'm forcing him a little or approach him too close, he pushes me away pretty brutally... I don't know what to do anymore."

"And what about his best friend, J... Jason? Jason is that it?"

The mute had been about to break his vow of never speaking ever again in order to correct that annoying error, but he bit his bottom lip right before doing so, only glancing at the doctor who gladly caught that small reaction.

"Jackson, and he's doing really fine! He keeps on telling him that he doesn't blame him... Why would he even–" his dad sighed. "They still are best friends, well, at least I hope so... They used to laugh all the time, the house was so lively whenever the whole group of friends came, but ever since Jackson got out of the hospital, each one of their visits has been them talking to a wall and leaving with an upset expression on their faces..."

"How long has it been since the accident? Two months right?" the doctor asked while swinging slowly in his black chair.

"Yes..." the father answered, his voice trembling and, anticipating the fall of heavy tears that had accumulated under his tired eyelids, he grabbed a tissue from a box on the desk in front of him. "Two months since my wife died... And two months since Mark hasn't said a word."

The eyes of the said Mark landed on his father's back, whose shoulders were so down that he could clearly see how heavy the weight he carried on them was, and his heart squeezed in his chest.

"Mark? Can you come forward for a second?" the psychiatrist and hypnotherapist, Dr. Woodam Hwang, called for him along with a motion of his fingers signaling him to sit on the empty chair across his father's.

Mark executed himself, all the while looking at the ground as he exhaled quietly, and he sat on the chair, spreading his legs nonchalantly. After the tatters of the couch, he started to play with the ones of his ripped pair of jeans, not showing a bit of interest in the man in a white blouse facing him. Everything coming from his demeanor and facial expressions could tell how annoyed he was to be here and to have those psychiatric sessions that were far from helpful, at least in his eyes. Two months and four different doctors without a concluding diagnostic had passed ; why his father still hadn't given up on him just like he himself had?

Like the previous times, the doctor would pretend he knows everything that was stepping on his mind as well as the reasons he was doing this to himself, but up till now, it only had been wrong assumptions.

Like the previous times, his father would believe in the doctor's words, as they sound pretty right when they're coming from a professional's mouth. And because he can't talk anymore, Mark won't be able to tell him how ridiculous the diagnosis was, nor to explain himself.

Like the previous times, the link between his father and him would only shatter even more, destroyed by Mark's silence and the scary names that were given to his "sickness", or "trauma" as they say.

Aphasia, check ; temporary disablement, nope ; post-traumatic syndrome, maybe… Four doctors, and none of them, after having gone around those popular medical possibilities, had saved a final solution to the main problem : Mark had made a choice. None of them, had found the key to unlock his blocking that made him aim to shut himself up, forever.

So, in the end, Mark was once again going to be everything the doctor would want him to be. Two had said it would stop "sooner or later", remaining the vaguer possible – probably to get his father's hopes up ; and the other two had somehow reached the truth, as they had concluded that no one can really do anything against the power of human's will – at least without using force.

But still, where all of them had went wrong anyway, was when they had prescribed him a psychiatric treatment in the end – to cash the check, right? Or was it really because of their duty to take care of their patients, even the lost causes like him?

And, like the previous times, this psychiatric treatment wouldn't work, because Mark wasn't sick ; he was doing this voluntarily and didn't want it to stop. And that, his father either refused to accept it, or wouldn't believe it.

"I'm not expecting you to talk when it's only our first session together, Mark. But I'm going to deliver you my first conclusion, and if you don't agree, or if there's anything you want to tell, write it down there."

Dr. Hwang slid a blank sheet of paper along with a pencil in front of the empty-looking boy who nodded without great conviction. Mark felt the hopeful look of his father on him burn his cells, but he didn't mirror it as he laid back in his chair, waiting for the fantastic diagnostic this doctor would have reached. He quickly eyed the pin on the man's blouse and almost rolled his eyes at the sight of its lettering.

A hypnotherapist? Seriously dad?

"The shock must have affected you a lot, and I totally understand that. But what I'm fearing right now, is that it is transforming into a trauma that would block you for life..." the psychiatrist started, his eyes going back and forth between the two gloomy men on the other side of his desk. "Everybody knows that the loss of a mother is really hard for the child, whatever age he or she is, but even more when it has been as brutal as what you went through. In fact, the main problem is, that you were present when it happened."

Mark finally looked up to gaze at the serious doctor's face, who bent forward to lay his elbows on the desk, linking his fingers together as he was slowly reaching the heart of his analysis.

"And what I think is that... You feel guilty. For not having cried for help when you should have in your eyes, because you were the only one that was still conscious when the car crashed. I think, that you believe that you speaking is useless now, because your voice hasn't been of any help at that time. You believe that she died because of you, so overall, you feel guilty for having survived, and not her. Am I wrong?"

Shit, that bastard. He's… right?

Mark only shrugged before looking away from the doctor who smiled quickly, feeling proud to have seemingly pinpointed the problem.

"But what I believe, Mark, is that your mother surely wouldn't want you to inflict this to yourself."

He caught the angry stare of his client and it made him even prouder. He was getting closer.

"I believe you're too young to waste your life like this. Do you know that it is only normal that you didn't cry for help? You just had an accident, Mark. You were upside down when they found you that night ; you were hurt and shocked as well! Yes, people came late, but they still did, and it saved both your life and your best friend's! You shouldn't feel guilty for that, but lucky!"

Mark felt a sudden wave of rage running in his whole body. What did he even know? Was he there? He hadn't been that hurt, there was the proof : he only stayed three days at the hospital, while his best friend laid one month in a bed and his mother... His mother...

"I know. I know you're deadly mad at me right now, and you have all the rights to be. I saw how you had been about to curse at me earlier when I misspelled Jackson's name, so I know you can talk. I know you can, but you won't. And my job consists in, helping you. So I'll try to help you as much as I can. I'll help you until I've found the thing inside of you that would make you want to talk again. You're a good person Mark, I can see that, as you take all the blame for yourself. But let me help you overcome this trauma, will you?"

I'm not sick. I'm not traumatized. Leave me alone, fuck.

Unexpectedly, a quiet sob broke out, and when Mark turned his head to the left, he spotted his father hiding in his coat's sleeve, a hand up in the air to excuse himself, as he was crying. The only time Mark had seen his father cry, in his whole 21 years of existence, was no other than at his mother's funeral. Not at the hospital when the doctors had pronounced her dead, not on the first night they had spent home without her presence to lighten the mood, not at the church when they had celebrated her beautiful personality and heard touching speeches on how a good woman she was, no ; at the cemetery, when her coffin had sunk deeper and deeper into the ground. When he had finally realized that she was gone.

But there he was, the proud and strong man he had always been, crying in the doctor's cabinet because of him, again. Mark's own tears were about to come out, but he rolled his eyes in the back to prevent them to do so. Because of me. I'm the one who should've died.

"I think we should at least try, for you, but also for you and him" the doctor smiled. "You're 21, so I won't treat you like a child. I can't impose you to come. It's only up to you, Mark."

Mark hated this idea. He wanted to be left alone and live his own life as a mute ; hell, he was fine like that! He grabbed the pen in front of him and was about to write an immense "BULLSHIT!" that would have taken all the paper before crumpling it and throw the ball at the psychiatrist. Yet, as he caught his father looking at him expectantly, the tears now wiped away from his face but his eyes still shimmering with hope and something near a plead, Mark resigned himself and reluctantly wrote a small "ok.", and he heard the doctor sigh in contentment.

"Fine! I'll set you an appointment in two months. You can come, if you want to."

Two years later

He approached his face to the mirror, searching meticulously for any sign of tiredness that needed to disappear as soon as he'd went out the door, because he hadn't the right to be tired. His boss had been kind enough to accept him in spite of his disablement, so Mark felt like he had to do extremely well as a payback.

Suddenly, the bathroom's door creaked and Jackson pushed it open, the morning's mist still readable in his squinted eyes, and after having blinked a few times to get accustomed to the light, he finally recognized his best friend that was looking back at him.

"Oh, hi Mark, woken up early" his raspy voice managed to be heard and Mark chuckled before reaching out his hand, waiting for their own greeting.

A few tricks of palms and fingers later, they both were now brushing their teeth with their eyes closed, undeniably wishing they could've stayed longer in their beds.

"Why do we have to wake up and go to work or classes, huh? I'm going to collapse sooner or later" Jackson whined with his toothbrush still in his mouth, but Mark kicked him in the arm before placing a finger on his frothy lips, signaling him into the glass to make less noise. "Ah right, the boys are sleeping, them, at least."

Mark had moved out of his house seven months ago, right after he had finished his cooking distance lessons and found his job as a kitchen clerk – if he wasn't dishwashing during the worst days – in a restaurant downtown. It was the perfect job where he didn't need to talk, as he was only executing orders without questioning. The perfect job that also fitted him and his lonely character, as he was most of the time left alone while preparing the steps of one meal or dressing up the plates. That, was the only thing he was thankful for Dr. Hwang, who had come up with a great plan B when he had dropped out of college – to his father's despair.

He was now living along with his six best friends in a huge colocation that was noisier, cheerier and livelier, yet more comfortable than with his own father. Some would say he was avoiding him like a coward as well as the tensed situation he had come to build between them ; still, his true friends right here had deeply understood when he had explained in their groupchat that he felt the need to leave, persuaded it was for the better.

He hadn't expected a positive response from each one of them when he had randomly offered to move in with him, as he still was thinking he was an ultimate burden for everyone he was close to, even more now that they had to speak through messages or properly learned – yet personalized – sign language. However, here they were altogether, and Mark could really tell the difference : he could finally breathe.

No more duty to go the appointments with Dr. Hwang every two months in order to please his dad ; no sensation of guilt every time he would catch him looking at pictures of his mother, still mourning two years after that ; no need to see him desperate as he was facing the non-evolution of his son's situation. He loved his father, deeply and truly, and that's why he felt even more satisfied that he had left, as he was sure it was taking a thousand of worries out of his mind.

Also, Mark had turned 23 years old, and his young adult's aim for independence had dragged him out of his house full of sorrow. His days were no longer guided by the routine of his distance learning for the cooking diploma – sending pictures of his creations and being with people only for the final exams had truly been better than dealing with his disablement at college –, nor by his fucking psychiatric sessions – seven months he hadn't gone to one, oups.

Now, he was a full-time worker, earning his own life, and living his youth the best he could with what he allowed himself to have. He mostly had a social life thanks to the random parties his roommates would throw from time to time at the apartment with their other friends, or the late-night snacks he shared with them before TV series, or the beer-and-chicken after dinner – if there even was a dinner ; sometimes the boys were too lazy or tired to cook.

Because aside from those six dorks, Mark hadn't made any acquaintances, not even at work where colleagues remained colleagues, as even if they were all really kind, the barrier of his silence and his secretive personality were making it difficult to get close to him. And unfortunately, his will to speak again was nowhere to be seen.

Deep inside, Mark had been in perpetual suffering and blocking, his dark thoughts resurfacing more frequently than what he had expected, even if Jackson was doing more than well now, and his mom was surely resting in peace. Even if his friends were trying to reach out to him and make him talk sometimes, once he was drunk or when they had serious conversations about life, hoping their mate would break his walls and finally let go.

Mark hadn't put any efforts in his psychiatric sessions, and while Dr. Hwang clearly knew about that, he hadn't given up on him. Every two months since he had left his father's house, Mark had been receiving a small text reminding him there still was an appointment reserved for him – same time, same place – and that it would be the case until he clearly tells he doesn't want to come anymore.

Nevertheless, Mark had always left the psychiatrist on read. Not that he thought of returning anytime soon, no – maybe ? –, but because every time he had been about to turn it down once and for all, the face of his father had popped up in his mind, and he had been unable to do it. Guilt. Always that fucking guilt. His father, whom he lied to when he was telling him he had went, as the latter wasn't accompanying him anymore under the doctor's wish. For now, he had been lucky enough that Dr. Hwang hadn't said a word about it, but for how long…

Bzzt bzzt.

Is it this time of the month already?

Mark looked down on the sink where his smartphone was placed, and when the screen lit up, he indeed saw the text popping up and he swallowed a sigh. Maybe I should tell him I won't come anymore. Maybe it is time.

Jackson had looked down too from the corner of his eye, and if he had bit back his tongue for the past three sessions, this time he couldn't stand it anymore.

"Aren't you going to go?" he asked while combing his hair.

Mark looked surprised as he addressed him a curious gaze, his brows up on his forehead, so Jackson grabbed the opportunity to go on.

"I wasn't going to say anything but shit Mark, I know these appointments are doing you good bro!" he half-exclaimed half-whispered, and suddenly his friend's expression turned into a pissed one.

No they don't, Mark implicitly answered with a move of his head and index from the left to the right.

"Yes, they do."

Silence. Jackson sighed as he was searching for the right words to say now that he had opened his mouth.

"You know… Shit, I'm telling you I don't care." he muttered in a low voice at first, before looking straight into his best friend's eyes. "I heard you talk a few weeks ago, in your bedroom" he bluntly confessed as he crossed his arms on his toned chest.

***

Indeed, one night, Mark hadn't been able to sleep. He had tossed and turned in his bed, sometimes looking at the ceiling of his empty bedroom, sometimes scrolling down his social media, sometimes putting his head under the pillow. Numerous thoughts had crossed his mind, out of nowhere, from his souvenirs with his mother, to some with his friends from back then, to the work he would have to do only in a few hours. And to add to his suffering, his throat had been terribly sore. It had burned and itched, and after some clearing of it, Mark had been surprised himself when his voice had come out.

Out of curiosity, with his heart pumping in his chest to the point it felt like it would tear his ribcage apart, Mark had dived under his sheets and, once he had been hidden like a child in his hut of blankets, he had dared to talk, after two years and a few months of locking up his own instrument, of sewing his lips, of punishing himself.

"A-A-Aaah. Aaaaah. Ah. Oh shit I can talk. Shit shit shit. That's weird. Fucking… weird. Enough now. Ouch, it hurts… Oh god it's… so weird. I should stop now… They're going to hear me. Why can't I stop? Stop it Tuan. Oh… fuck."

Putting a hand on his mouth, a heavy-breathing Mark had finally stopped ranting as soon as he had felt some kind of pleasure in talking again, because if he really did, he knew he wouldn't be able to stick to his vow anymore. So he had laid back on his pillow with his mouth still covered, his eyes wide open in shock and the tone of his voice piercing his eardrums. No need to say, that he never found sleep.

***

"What?" Mark's eyes told Jackson.

"Yes I did, and because I'm smart I let you live. I was fucking shocked too you know, I just woke up to go to the bathroom and when I heard your voice in the middle of the night, I got scared at first, thinking someone was there!"

Mark blinked a few seconds more, and for the first time in their friendship, he felt uneasy under Jackson's eyes that clearly were daring him to try and lie about it into his face.

"Look, even if I still think that's nonsense, I can continue to respect that you don't want to talk. It's been two years already but well, I can try to get that. But you have to understand that it's pretty frustrating to know you actually talk to yourself, when even with us you don't..."

The fake mute quickly grabbed his phone and started typing something hastily, too irritated to think of the hands' moves he had to do to depict what was on his mind.

"It was accidental, and it only happened once! I didn't talk to myself after that! And I won't!"

He showed the memo piece right under Jackson's eyes, which he instantly rolled before sighing loudly.

"Don't tell me it didn't feel great when you did! It's been two years, you can stop now! I'm doing fine, your mom's in peace, why are you doing this to yourself?"

"You know why" Mark simply wrote after having snatched the phone from his best friend's hands which had been up in the air from frustration.

"No I don't know anymore! Let's count down the reasons you shouldn't be that way : she was the one driving, you were shocked, pretty hurt too, nobody in this situation could have cried for help, we are alive, I can walk and dance, it was an accident…"

The skinny man's hand suddenly hit the glass and the noise resounded in all the room, making Jackson jump in surprise before he took a few steps forward to firmly grab Mark's shoulder. The latter didn't shove him away, as he was busy dealing with his heart that was vibrating along with his arms because of his clenched fists. He exhaled slowly so that he wouldn't smash the mirror into million broken pieces, just like he were.

"Mark. I'm sorry but you leave me no choice. I won't repeat it twice. It's either you go to this session and the ones that will follow and try a little bit harder to overcome whatever is blocking you, either I go myself and tell what I heard to the doctor. And I might tell the boys as well, and they won't leave you alone, especially Jinyoung and you know it, he's still actively searching for a way to make you talk after two years."

Mark straightened himself and he turned around to face Jackson who gulped in anticipation, because even if he was being straightforward right now, deep down he knew the risk he had taken by digging up the past to finally let it all out.

"You gotta be kidding me right now" Mark carefully wrote this time before showing up the screen, his eyes darkening with annoyance second by second as he watched Jackson's next moves.

How could his closest friend do this to him? He felt betrayed at the highest point, and the Chinese boy in front of him could read it in his turned off eyes that targeted him.

"No, I'm not. I want you to feel better. Don't tell me you're fine as it is, I'm done with this bullshit. Go. To. This. Session. Or I'm waking them up right now."

Mark didn't want to. He hated being treated as a mentally ill patient. He was fine. He had a job, he had true friends, and he had a nice flat, what else did he need? Yes, this memory still tortured him, but how talking again would do him any good? It wouldn't change what happened, would it?

However, now that he was facing this ultimatum that was more challenging than what he had expected, now that he could decipher on Jackson's traits how worried but determined he was, Mark's weaker side took the best of him and he was about to give in.

"C'mon. Grant me like, five sessions, where you actually make an effort. And if in the end I am wrong, I'll let you live as I always have" Jackson's raspy voice pierced through the thick silence that had settled for long seconds after his threat, and slowly, Mark nodded with his brows furrowing, showing his reluctance as he did. "Yes! You'll thank me later!"

And with that, Jackson left the bathroom in a dancing pace to go change, leaving a numb Mark that couldn't think about anything else but the session that was tomorrow. Not even about the fact that the clock had been ticking with all this mess going on, and that now he was almost late.

Grey. The sky was just grey. A light tint of grey with a glimpse of gold, the one that could hurt your pupils and burn your eyelids if you stared at it for too long. But still, it was a pretty grey. The sun's rays shined right above the accumulated clouds who luckily hadn't cried yet, making the overall light outside so bright, and leaving a calm veil over the town in the streets of which you were now walking with a smile on your lips.

The only thing you were hearing was the loud music in your earphones, its volume almost turned to its maximum, but you needed to make sure your eardrums were focusing on the singer's voice and that only. Not on the million concerned speeches of the people buzzing around you – like it had done lately, to the point it had given you headaches. Well, now that you were thinking of it, it had been a while since you hadn't heard a single unfamiliar voice infiltrating your head before those constant hummings, another one than your own that is.

Your godfather, who was a talented psychiatrist and hypnotherapist you were really close to, had told you that you were gifted once he had acknowledged that you weren't crazy. Because as crazy as it sounds, ever since you were little and without you being able to explain why, you could read minds. No, more specifically, you could hear the negative thoughts of people you came to know personally, without them wording it to you.

It seemingly depended on two things : either you had a sufficient bond with the person – a classmate you saw each day, a friend, a lover…–, either they had so many bad thoughts that you couldn't help but hear it. So sometimes, just talking to them or greeting them shortly once made their worries, their pain, their boredom, their anger flood through your ears.

At first, your parents hadn't believed you when you had told them you could "hear voices" while everybody in the class was quiet, and that it was disturbing you so much you couldn't concentrate on the lesson. You didn't have any idea of whose voices it was or what they were saying, as you were too young to master your power and focus on it yet. However, firstly when they had seen your grades dropping from your lack of understanding of the teaching ; and secondly when they had witnessed themselves your ability the day you had repeated word for word what they had thought deep down after you had complained another time, they finally had let go of their rational side in order to help out their daughter.

They did a great job at protecting you, not even talking about it to their closest friends, too scared that anyone could become a greedy enemy once they got to know that the supernatural did exist, or that, even while being of good faith, they would spread the news so that soon enough you would have been under the spotlight, exposed as an alien or whatever gifted child the medias would have labeled you, stealing your childhood and putting you at risk of scientific experiments.

But in the middle of all that implicit protection you hadn't seen, you yourself still had to deal with those non-stopping rantings into your head. And as a young and innocent child, you couldn’t know the harm it would do to you once you tried to help the others. You couldn't understand the concept of privacy, nor the one of family's secrets, nor the idea that you alone couldn't find a solution to everyone's problems.

Still, you tried to, with your school's friends and their own little concerns – not that being hungry and craving for something to eat was difficult to solve –, but when it had come to really mean yet childish comments about someone into their heads or more serious problems, you quickly had started to feel depressed to know of the dark side of this life and world, moreover because you couldn't do anything about it.

You still remembered that friend and classmate of yours back when you were in 3rd year of primary school, who had constantly been complaining to herself about how bad her arms hurt and how much she didn't like her father when he hit her and her mom and yelled at them ; and every time she had been watching other's loving dads at the school's gates, you had heard her envious comments. So one day, as you had finally seen him coming to pick her up, not a smile to curl his lips as you had approached him along with her who had been looking at the ground, you had blurted out :

"Why are you hurting Myeoli, mister? She's hurting, why?"

Your own father that had been standing next to him had suddenly grabbed you by the shoulders and pulled you closer, apologizing on your behalf with his heart beating loud as he had quickly gotten a hold of what you had been insinuating. It had been innocent, a true and thoughtless question from a kid who couldn't quite understand what domestic violence was at that age, and while your friend had looked at you with surprise and fear pulling her traits, the scary man's face had decomposed itself for a second before it turned into something unreadable.

And unexpectedly, you had caught only one of his thoughts : "So you're talking about it to your friends, huh? Let's see if you would want to after we go home". Little did you know what it had meant back then ; but the next day, you had caught her covering some blue bruises while changing for the sports lesson, and overnight, she had started ignoring you and never talked to you again, because she would have been "beaten to death" if she did, as you heard.

And then, with the bond being broken, with her striking you out of her life, you had stopped hearing about her concerns, while the situation the little-you couldn't have saved anyway, never ceased. It was another aspect of your weird power, its capacity to turn off as unexpectedly as it had turned on with someone. It looked like you only had one shot to repair the person's situation, and with her, you had missed the target.

After that girl, you assumed the thing you had was a serious deal. After that, your parents took you to your dad's best friend who also was your godfather, a psychiatrist and hypnotherapist who then was eccentric enough to believe into psyche and any mystic thing that could explain your ability. After having listened to the whole story and without even using his hypno tricks, he confidently told you he would help you deal with it thanks to the bit he knew about it.

And he did. Thanks to him, you learned to focus on some voices only, but also to shut every one of them up whenever you didn't want to know. Because the more you grew up, the less you wanted to know. Indeed, when you finally understood the notion of intimacy, you felt awful for trespassing it even involuntarily, mostly because it was with your own friends. You felt as if you were a traitor only building unhealthy relationships where the person couldn't help but getting naked in front of you, and that even before she had legitimately granted you the right to see her wholly.

On top of that, hearing all the misery of the world pulled your own moral down, because the sensation of being powerless while facing the worst situations ate you. And even when you tried to help, it only resulted in you being hurt because you had given too much of yourself doing so, either as some people took advantage of your kindness, or as you got way too implicated.

However, at some point, you had had enough. Enough of being kind and understanding, enough of having headaches by trying hard to ignore the constant white noise in your ears, enough of dealing with people's shit and whines when you had your own to begin with. This angry state of mind along with the will to throw your Mother Teresa's costume out the door once and for all made it harder and challenging for your godfather's helping words to reach you. Still, he didn't give up and kept on telling you how and when you could use it in a way that would make you proud because, as he loved to remind you, you were gifted.

And in the end, you had been left with no choice but to grab his hand, and you learned to use it more than to duct it. You learned to feel things. To feel when your friends truly needed your help and support, so that you could permit yourself to open your ears and, instead of bluntly revealing what you knew, you threw clues at them that you were getting the problem and were here for them.

To feel when you definitely had to shut the voices up, mostly when it came to acquaintances or the people you cherished so much that it killed you to violate their intimacy – you first had tried it on your godfather himself, successfully. And when you caught something bad but not on purpose, just because of your loss of focus, you learned not to feel guilty, nor to take it to heart or too seriously.

"We have over 60 000 thoughts going on our minds per day, Y/N. How can you believe each one of them is accurate, is full of sincerity, or is actually what's the person's thinking?" your godfather had said once, leaving you speechless, as always.

And when college time came along with the choice of your main course, you picked yours without hesitating, the one leading you to become like your role model : your godfather himself. You decided you'd help people every day but through your job – "without cheating" like he would say – as you had now developed some true psychologic and understanding skills without even using your power, and you liked it. No, you loved it, helping people, finding solutions, removing some burden off their shoulders and seeing their faces lit up.

So right now, your 23 year-old self was on its way to Dr. Hwang Woodam's cabinet with pressed strides, as it was the first session of many more he had proposed you to attend after classes, in order to build yourself a better idea of the job. Many sessions which would lead you, hopefully, to being a well-prepared and irreproachable psychiatrist at the end of your diploma.

The second you slid your headphones from your skull to your neck, murmurs joined the sounds of the busy town you were in and you frowned. It was really weird. How come you were hearing random voices now? Or had you met every single human being in this huge town? Impossible. You knew your power was constantly evolving, changing its characteristics whenever it wanted to, but what you couldn't stand was the fact that you felt like all your hard work to control it was in vain. You sure would share a word about it to your godfather at the end of the day.

You pushed his cabinet's door at 1:59pm precisely and, the second he saw you come in, a smile lit up his face.

"Y/N! My lovely niece, come here!" he called for you as you hurried yourself before him, and he held you in his arms. "We don't have the time to chat as the first client of this afternoon is already here, but let's have dinner together after that, okay?"

You nodded as you retreated, and you thanked him a thousand times when you saw he had prepared your own little desk next to his, with some files waiting for you to go through, an empty notebook with a beautiful cover, pencils in a little pot and a mug waiting to be filled with whatever would help you stay awake throughout the afternoon.

You immediately started to read the first patient's folder, and its seriousness instantly plunged you into the intensity of the job. If sometimes you had thought you were having a hard life hearing negative thoughts all the time, you once again reminded yourself that if your godfather had been that helpful with you, it was because he too had a hard time dealing with this, yet he still did, without failing or complaining. It was so fascinating, but you could already guess how tiring it should be.

Because hypnotherapy had become a trend nowadays, some patients that came by merely had problems, or ones you didn't consider as really serious psychologically speaking, so you allowed yourself to stop taking notes of the sessions in order to read further the upcoming cases. And one particularly grabbed your attention, because of the number of missed rendezvous – already three? –, as well as the question marks next to a list of the patient's "potential syndromes" on the front cover.

You discretely put it in front of you and, after having tied your hair up in whatever hairdo that would keep them from your face, you started your lecture of the first page, slower than with the previous ones as your godfather's notes were really intriguing. First of all, the man – named Mark Yi En Tuan – was the same age as yours, so his case interested you even more : maybe you would be able to understand it a little bit better and suggest something this time…?

Wait a minute. Mark Tuan. You definitely knew this name. Where had you heard it? Where did it come from? You kept your right index on the name printed in bold characters before closing your eyes as you searched through your memory, and some bell finally rang into your messy head, making you gasp. You suddenly put both of your hands on your mouth to smother the exclamation of shock that had been about to follow. Mark Tuan, of course you knew him! He had been your crush a little more than 2 years ago at the university!

He was a guy with some crazily handsome features, and you had come to know, while digging facts about him back then, that he could spin swiftly in the air like a ninja and that he was able to speak English, Korean, Chinese and Japanese fluently, without languages studies being his major – what had been his major already...? You had never talked to him, only luckily sharing one English class with him during your 3rd year, where you had first spotted him and slowly went head over heels for his looks, his sexy English accent and his quiet aura that made him even more attractive somehow.

Simply looking at him from afar during a semester, too focused on your studies and your friends to even think of approaching a guy, you still had remarked when he had suddenly been absent from classes during the second part of school year, depriving you from your weekly daydream spent at eyeing him. And later, you had heard the boy had dropped out of college, for a reason you never got to know. Some of his friends were still attending the same university as yours this year, yet they had never shared a word about it to anyone. Not even Park Jinyoung who you knew quite well and talked a lot to, as you shared a few classes with him since he majored in contemporary literature.

Maybe the reason was lying right under your eyes? You were torn between contrary emotions, the embarrassment of being about to read something so personal about someone you "knew", the familiar sensation of guilt you were fighting every single day because of your power suddenly submerging you ; but at the same time, excitement and curiosity were bubbling in your stomach, preventing it from knotting harder and harder under your discomfort. Anyway though, you would eventually come to know about it if he ever passed the cabinet's door so…

… So you opened the file. And the more you were going down the lines, the darker his story was becoming and you felt as lost as your godfather – who was busy transcribing in his own notebook the last session at the moment. Your brows furrowed as you discovered the testimony of Mark's father, telling about an accident in which the wife and mother died. It had happened a little more than two years ago… Mark and his best friend called Jackson – oh my God Jackson Wang? The student council vice-president?! – had been coming back from a trip to China, their flight landing at 2 in the morning, and Mark's mom had been kind enough to come and pick them up before driving them home.

However, the boys soon fell asleep because of the travel, and the mother, from the lack of something to keep her awake, had found her eyelids closing for longer and longer as the miles went by, also tired from this round trip in the middle of the night. And unfortunately, her car had went out of the road, making tons of rolls down to the side to end upside down in the middle of nowhere, at night. Being the only one conscious, Mark had been too weak to come out of the car and crawl up to stop a driver for help.

He had witnessed his mother's last breath, he had seen she was dying under his eyes, and he hadn't been able to do anything, neither his body nor his voice responding. And… What?! He felt guilty for that?

Your eyes almost popped out of their holes as you read, reread, and rereread those last words your godfather had underlined. Ever since, he had been refusing to speak because, according to the diagnosis, he considered that his voice hadn't been useful when he had needed it to be, so it was its punishment. Mark was punishing himself… for an accident.

Why hasn't he come to the last three sessions…?

You flipped the pages that always concluded the same thing : "No progress". It seemed like Mark was really out of reach, but it somehow made you eager to try yourself. You took it as your own personal challenge, and you couldn't wait to see if, today, you would be lucky enough to sit once again in the same room as him. Deep down too, you were eager to see his beautiful face again after all this time.

Your eyes started to look up at the door on your left every two seconds after you had finished, waiting impatiently for his frame to appear. And under the table, you kept your fingers crossed, wishing he wouldn't recognize you nor accept the proposition of you leaving that your godfather had made with every patient up till now.

You were lucky, because Mark did come. At 6:00pm, a really deep, low, and masculine voice resounded into your ears, even if you had successfully suppressed the ones of every single client you had met today.

*What am I doing here… Jackson I'm going to kill you. Why did I oblige? I shouldn't have. Shit.*

Jackson? Jackson… Oh my God! The best friend! It must be Mark!

You bit back a smile and a giggle of excitement as you needed to remain silent during the session going on, still you bounced a little on your chair as you put his file on the top of your pile once again. He had a really pleasant voice ; such a shame he was hiding it from everyone's ears, but it made you even gladder that you had caught at least a glimpse of it. Yet, you closed your eyes and took a deep breath, focusing in order to stop hearing him as you had promised yourself you wouldn't use your power if you were willing to be professional. However…

*Great, he's late now. I have the time to go, shouldn't I? It's even more embarrassing now that I skipped 3… Fuck my life.*

As you still could hear him, you realized he should be of the category of people that had so many bad thoughts that you couldn't help but hear them. It alarmed you about his true lack of well-being, because three years earlier, you had never heard his voice inside your head, not a single time. Well, now that you were thinking of it, it only made sense as he presently never let them out, so they surely kept buzzing again and again into his mind.

The patient before him left the room, and if your godfather had been about to sigh in defeat at the sight of his next appointment, when you lightly tapped his shoulder, it was as if you instantly shared your thrill with him before you even had announced the great news, as he felt some chills go down his arm under your touch.

"He's there" you smiled, and Woodam almost jumped out of his chair, his brows up on his wrinkling forehead as he smacked his hands together.

"You must be kidding me?!" he exclaimed a little bit louder than expected, and you eyed the door with concern, worried that it would make the angel-like boy fly away before you even got the chance to watch him land into the room.

"I can hear him. And he's pretty stressed out right now" you chuckled and in no time, your godfather was in front of the door frame, greeting that particular someone with a bright smile.

You stood up, drying your palms that had grown sweaty from anticipation on your thighs and, for the first time in your life, you suddenly stopped hearing Mark's ceaseless ranting voice, but not because you had chosen to ; because it got covered by the loud beatings of your excited heart that sped crazily its tempo the second he entered the room.

Handsome. He still was so handsome, as depressed as he was supposed to be, as affected as he should be, as fragile as he must be. Mark walked quietly in the room at a lazy pace, targeting the leather chair on which he naturally seated, not even greeting you with his eyes that were stuck to the ground – well, no sound had come out from your mouth anyway, as your crush for him was resurfacing and oppressing every single one of your muscles.

He was wearing a black trench coat which length almost reached his ankles, with a black turtleneck under it, and a navy blue pair of skinny jeans suiting his thin legs, ended by a pair of black sneakers that seemed huge on his feet. His deep brown and shiny hair wasn't styled in any way, parting naturally in two after he had combed it with his ringed fingers, and when he sighed discretely, your eyes went down on his face that had dug with time and probably depression, and you almost could decipher the small dots of a beard above his plump lips.

The question was : for how long had you been staring at him to be able to see even those small details?

Too long, obviously, and you realized it when you had to shake yourself out of your trance to notice that the boy was now looking at you with his brows furrowed, while your godfather was smiling at you awkwardly.

"He's okay with you staying, Y/N, you can sit now…?" Woodam tried and you jumped in surprise, looking at him with doe-like eyes before you executed yourself, your head becoming a hot-air balloon about to pop under the pressure and embarrassment.

Woodam has already asked the question? Why didn't I hear it? Y/N, focus!

Mark hadn't recognized you, and it was the only thought that came to soothe your internal lecture and make you dare to look at him once again. However, you hadn't expected for him to be staring at you in return, a curious light in his dark eyes that quickly avoided yours when it reached more than two seconds. He tilted his head to the side and you gulped, scared that he was about to change his mind, because it now looked like your face was familiar to him. Had he paid attention to you back then? Stop it Y/N, you're raving and giving yourself too much credit.

I've seen her before. Where? Where… Where?

Luckily for him, it wasn't a bad thought, so you didn't catch it. Unfortunately for you, though, but you probably would have succumbed to the shock. You needed to suit yourself back into your professional skin, not the one of a ridiculous and immature girl in front of an old crush she should have forgotten about by now. But why did it inch at every end of your tensed body to have him in the same room as you after all this time?

"Well, Mark, I'm really happy to see you today. I must confess that I thought I'd never see you again at this point, but looks like my persistence has won! Here" your godfather finally spoke up as he slid a pen and a few sheets of blank paper along with a book as a hard surface to easy the writing to his patient, who put them on his knees before actually starting to write something.

"Thanks for not telling my father."

You eyed Woodam who smiled warmly and nodded, his chin resting on his hands he had joined.

"I've told you since the beginning that I won't treat you like a child. The only adult I'm doing this to is my niece right here, she's still a baby sometimes even though you're the same age!" he chuckled and you frowned as you felt embarrassed that he was making fun of you before Mark.

This time, Mark clearly squinted his eyes while looking at you, and you read in his pupils that he was analyzing your face in order to picture it somewhere into his memory. Don't recognize me please, I'm a nobody, I swear…

Who the hell is she? *God why am I not good at remembering like Jinyoung or Jackson seriously!*

You gulped and your eyes grew big at the hearing of such a thought, indicating he was indeed investigating his memory because you were familiar. Mark knew your face, a face he was sure he had already commented himself about its prettiness, but why couldn't he bring his memories back together? Somewhere in the mist of his confusion and his deep thoughts, he could picture those two eyes that were looking back at him, still he didn't know which was the right landscape he should be drawing them in. Had it been at the uni? At one of his friends’ party? At a random café?

"And may I ask you why you decided to come back, out of a sudden?" the psychiatrist interrupted his torments and Mark finally stopped staring at you intensely, helping you breathe again as you had started to feel smaller and smaller under his gaze.

As far as you could remember, he already had seemed to be this kind of straightforward and nonchalant guy that was doing whatever he wanted to do and how he wanted to do, not slightly disturbed by the fact that he had been staring at you without blinking, contrary to normal people who wouldn't dare to do the same with strangers, unless they'd feel embarrassed, just as you had been earlier.

Mark drew a line under his first answer, concentrating to make it the straighter possible with his fingers displayed on the sheet to prevent it from moving, and you admired his taste for perfection. While his face was down, you permitted yourself to look him over one more time, changing your cosplay back for the young student with hearts in your eyes before the beautiful guy at school, but you couldn't care less. You loved being a teenager for the last semester you could allow yourself to, before you officially could become an active women, a psychiatrist with her own patients under responsibility and no time for those kind of daydreams anymore.

"Jackson blackmailed me this morning." Mark wrote honestly with a neat writing he showed your godfather, before drawing another line in anticipation for the next question.

You could see it wasn't their first session together, as they had their own codes for communicating, and as Mark was laid back really lazily in the chair that looked like his own.

"Oh he did? I guess you'll have to thank him for me! What was so challenging that you said yes? I'm sorry but I can't help being curious" Woodam pursued in a lighter tone, a smile never leaving his lips.

Mark hesitated an instant, his hair falling before his eyes that hadn't left the paper under them, and he sighed once again.

*He can be so intrusive sometimes…*

You caught that. You clenched your fists, your natural instinct of a niece feeling attacked by this poor remark about your godfather who was nothing but caring, not intrusive.

"He threatened me to tell something to the others at home" Mark showed, and your brows furrowed, wondering what kind of secret he was refusing to unveil fully.

"Oh a secret? A secret between best friends?" Woodam joked and Mark only shrugged, his facial expression telling him he could qualify it as whatever he'd like to. "Looks like it was kind of personal or embarrassing for you to take the deal" your godfather then concluded and you read quietly Mark's face, which changed into an annoyed frown.

The session begun with a few asks/replies that you took note of diligently, yet you quickly got disturbed by an intrusive voice murmuring in your head so many harsh things that became crucial, at least for you. It froze you into your seat, however you were burning with frustration.

Indeed, while Woodam was busy trying to ask him some accurate questions, Mark was literally not putting any effort in the session, keeping every single bit of his true self deep inside, when he should be giving in return for things to progress. When he wrote yes, he meant no, and the reverse. At every assumption Woodam made, he shrugged it off while thinking how right it was and how bad that upset him ; at every proposition Woodam offered, he wrote he'd think about it when deep inside he was already convinced that he wouldn't even give it a try.

In your eyes, what Mark couldn't bear, was the fact that your godfather was seeing a little bit more through him at each session when he didn't want anyone to know, inducing him to close his ears and laugh it off every time Woodam would point out what he had been thinking deep inside. Meanwhile, his voice kept on flooding into your eardrums, filling them to the fullest, with his real pain, his suffering, his self-curses that should have pained you too ; but damn, their roleplay pissed you off so much you couldn't think straight or listen to your kind heart anymore.

Two years had passed since the accident and he still thought he could trick your godfather? Speaking of the latter, why hadn't he broken this dead-point situation already? What ridiculous duet were you witnessing right now? Why was Woodam being way too cautious around Mark when he obviously knew he was faking to be an honest and mysterious man on the outside, making them turning round and round endlessly?

If you could understand the fact that Mark was "traumatized" and would naturally refuse the help from anyone, you couldn't stand him choosing to lie again and again instead of simply having the guts of telling he didn't want it and hated it. However, it went on, this laughable masquerade that did nothing but irritate you more and more as the two men seemed satisfied to be playing the hypocrites.

*What does she want, looking at me like that?*

"Can I ask a question?" you suddenly spoke up after having blocked a scoff, looking straight into Mark's pupils that eyed your figure, and the quick light of surprise that passed through them helped you gain confidence.

"Do you mind?" Woodam asked him without questioning your attempt, his trust in you limitless.

Mark shook his head from the left to the right and with that, you stood up from your seat, your legs surprisingly trembling but still guiding you to lean against the windows behind the desks. You felt thrilled at yourself for being that bold, however it was nothing compared to the flames of anger flaring your guts.

"Could you tell me, would your friends and family describe you as a good or a bad liar?" you asked precisely, on your way to a provocation that would hopefully earn at least a grunt from him.

*What the hell is this question?*

Woodam eyed you curiously, while Mark, the second he saw the proud smirk on your face, lost his composure he had worked on up till now so that people couldn't decipher when he was lying.

"Good liar, I guess, they used to call me poker face" he briefly wrote on his paper, his brows furrowing as he waited for your reply, and Woodam voiced the answer to you.

Weirdly though, Mark's heart started to beat a bit louder and his hands turned moist, as if you actually were putting some kind of pressure on him. He had tried his best not to pay attention to you during the whole session, or else his mind would've lost it from the countless "Who is she?" he would've asked himself. But right now, he wished he had accommodated himself to your presence a little bit more, as the more he was watching you, comfortably leaned back with your arms crossed and your chin up in defiance, the more he felt some powerful aura coming from you, with your eyes clearly lightened by something dangerously passionate, and giving him some chills he had failed to feel since quite a long time. You had such a presence even when your mouth was shut, and unexpectedly, his own turned dry as he started to anticipate what your point could be.

"Oh is it true? Because I wouldn't, truthfully. You're such a bad liar, Mr. Tuan, sorry if you're disappointed" you half joked, stepping to your chair to put both of your hands on its back. "I've met you only a few minutes ago, and I already can tell that you keep on lying. You know, we're only doing our job, and our job, is to help you. And from what I see, either you don't want to be helped at all, either you're scared of being helped. But let me tell you one thing : if you keep on saying the reverse of what's on your mind whenever you step in here, it's not necessary to come at all, we won't go anywhere. I can tell you're lying, Dr. Hwang can also tell you're lying, still you're thinking we're not aware of it? So what is it that you want from us? What's the purpose of all of this?"

Before you even knew it, words had flooded from your burning lips, the annoyance clear in your tone that you still kept as firm as possible so that he would get how serious you were about the issue. You couldn't help anyone who wasn't willing to get helped, that was a matter of fact, even if you hardly could admit it on a daily basis as you still were learning how to let go. But hearing too much of Mark Tuan for non-stopping 30 minutes and getting to know more than your godfather would ever reach even after two years because of his seemingly lack of guts to confront the boy, had made you greedy to be the one to wake him up.

Mark opened his mouth for a short time as if he had been about to protest but he quickly closed it, his lips forming a thin line, yet you caught the beginning of an eye-roll his pupils had been willing to do. Was he pissed at you right now? Was he offended? You'd be glad he could be if that ensured your words had an impact, yet, surprisingly, nothing came to your ears this time. Because, your raw ranting had somehow rang a bell inside of him and if, usually, he could quickly go over the truths Dr. Hwang pointed out about him, yours were resounding into his mind right now, making it turn blank.

However, the backfire of your boldness manifested itself quicker than what you would have thought, since now that the heavy words you had rummaged in your head had come out, the unexpected trance you had been in and that had given you the confidence to talk disappeared as soon as it had bloomed.

"E-Excuse me for a second" you suddenly said, and you rushed to the exit under two pair of eyes that watched you curiously.

Once you reached the empty waiting room, you collapsed on the first chair you saw before letting a long sigh escape your lips as you grasped your hair to get yourself straight. Mark's voice in your head became a distant humming, letting instantly place to a headache you hadn't really acknowledged as you had been too submerged by your frustration, but it was as if your thoughts were finally getting in order. What had you just said?! Mark wasn't the only one who would be lying in front of you later when you'll be seating right behind this desk, so why had you taken it to heart immediately?

"Y/N? What's wrong with you?" Woodam unexpectedly spoke up a few moments later, his tone calm. "Mark's gone now, you can come back."

You lifted your head up to see he was standing in the door frame, his eyes full of worry while yours became veiled by a deep red filter the second they landed on him.

"What's wrong is that I've heard every single thing inside his head, and that he just keeps on lying to you! And you? Why don't you say anything? You know he's lying but still you're not doing anything? I've been quite disgusted by your merry-go-round! If he doesn't want to be helped that badly, why waste your time, both of you? You know we can't do anything for someone that doesn't want to be helped at first!"

Y/N, BREATHE!

"Y/N, you know really well that a lot of patients express their disagreement to get helped because something's blocking them, right?" Woodam answered and some guilt dressed your pupils up, then when he suddenly smiled, you felt your tensed hands on your skull finally relax. "I'm not able to force him to open up to me, still I don't want to give up on him. It's our job Y/N, it's to still reach out to them whenever they need it, whatever time it takes, and even when they can't or won't express it. Mark came today, and even if it was because of Jackson, I had the feeling he was going to come back anyway."

A wave of self-deception crashed against your whole body as Woodam's wise words made you realize how wrong you had been to flare up in the first place. Whatever your reasons had been, as good as they had sounded, you needed to canalize your greed to be helpful that had made you implode like a bomb.

What had disturbed you was one thing : Mark had chosen to stop talking, and he was choosing to lie. No blocking, no post-traumatic syndrome you could treat with the methods they taught you, simply a choice. What he was doing, only him could undo it just by the power of his own will. What could you do against it? Once again, you had felt so powerless, and you hated it ; surely that had been the reason why you got overwhelmed to begin with. You were 23, still you had acted like when you used to be so affected whenever you couldn't decipher a way to help someone as fast as you wished. Bravo.

"I'm going home, I want to reflect back on myself because right now, I'm doubting my capacity to do this job, at all. It seems like I can't be as patient and understanding as you" you mumbled, tears prickling at the corner of your eyelids, and without letting your godfather reassure you as he always did, you walked to the cabinet, grasped your things with a mechanical but strong hand and within a minute, you were outside the building.

To be continued...

A/N : I’m actively working on Part 2 right now, I hope you’ll like me to post it! Let me know? Thanks for ever reading my work, once again!

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salarta · 6 years

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Analysis: Harley Quinn, Polaris, men in their lives

I don’t talk about Harley Quinn as much on here as other topics. My main view is that she was my favorite character of DC comics, the “rebirth” ruined her by throwing away her entire harlequin character theme to make her more or less “clown girl,” and any popularity we see for her today is much less than she could’ve had if DC hadn’t thrown away her identity.

Right now, I’m bringing this up not for Harley Quinn, but for Polaris and the way @marvelentertainment seems to see and treat her.

Harley Quinn

Despite my complaints, my reasons for those complaints, and what I’m certain would be happening if DC did things right by Harley Quinn, there’s still an important truth that must be acknowledged: Harley Quinn is currently incredibly popular. She could be more popular if done right, and much of her popularity right now is due to DC shoving their “reimagining” of Harley down everyone’s throats, but it doesn’t change the end result.

So why is current “Harley Quinn” popular? People can cite a lot of different things. People can disagree, or bring up a huge mishmash of elements. However, there’s one specific aspect of her newfound popularity that applies here: the popularity of “Harley Quinn” is not because of Harley’s connection to Joker but in spite of it.

Harley Quinn was created to be Joker’s henchgirl in the animated TV series. She became popular with her initial appearance and got recurring roles. This led to Harley getting fleshed out as a former psychiatrist that was seduced by Joker’s nature and ultimately became a domestic abuse survivor. Essentially, that was her origins - to be “beneath” Joker, to be his victim that was once a smart professional woman.

Fast forward. As Harley grew as a character, her horizons expanded. She developed a lesbian relationship with Poison Ivy. She had zany adventures in her own solo series (which I read, and was great up until somewhere around issue 25 or so). That was, I believe, the height of her popularity pre-”rebirth”. History with Joker came up, but amazingly, it was stories not involving Joker that got pursued the most when she was at her best.

Likewise, the popularity of the current “Harley Quinn” is never tied to stories involving Joker. One of the most popular relationships “Harley” has had in recent years is with Power Girl, to the point where a whole set of comics was made focused on it. When the Suicide Squad film came out, most of the tweets I saw concerning that version of “Harley Quinn” were about how great she was in the film when Joker wasn’t part of the story. And, as WB plans to make a Joker solo film, I see TONS of complaints from people about how shitty such a film would be vs wanting a Gotham Sirens sort of film featuring Harley.

Long story short? Harley Quinn was created to be “beneath” Joker, but when she finally got real, deliberate focus on herself as her own character, people came to love her more than Joker. The guy she’s supposedly “beneath.”

Polaris

Here’s the connection for Polaris: Havok.

I’m going to be fair to Havok, for Havok fans. He’s not a villain like Joker. When he’s actually written respectfully, he’s not an abusive shitheel.

However, how he is when written well does not change how their relationship was written for decades and how it always gets written when writers at Marvel try to bring it back.

Polaris was created as the daughter of Magneto who wants to be her own woman. The late 60s did still have sexism which trickled into some of her treatment, but Lorna was quite independent and more feminist than your average female character at the time.

Over time, and especially in the 70s and 80s, the idea of Lorna as “beneath” Havok (and several other characters) got pushed more and more at Marvel. Unlike DC with Harley Quinn, she wasn’t created with that toxic relationship. The toxic relationship was forced on her.

Their relationship is always Lorna acting as a supporting character for Havok’s stories.

Sometimes she’s written crying on his shoulder and blaming herself for crimes she didn’t commit, for no reason other than for the “big strong man” Havok to look good “comforting” her.

Sometimes she’s being tortured by the villain so we can see Havok’s “suffering” at hearing her in pain.

Sometimes, for no damn reason whatsoever, any concept of agency for herself is thrown out so she can spout about “what Alex would do.”

Sometimes, her entire purpose on a book is exclusively to be a reminder of “how wonderful the great and glorious Havok” is supposed to be, through things like having her spout “this isn’t you” or having her memories used to “restore” him after a multiple-issue story with him at the center.

And sometimes, big moments for her - like when she gets her origin story, or when she leads her own team for the first time - just have to have Havok shoved into them just so he can benefit.

Long story short: Marvel’s attitude toward Lorna is that she’s “beneath” Havok, and they keep going back to that over and over and over again.

They keep giving Havok opportunities they refuse to give Polaris. They keep forcing him into her stories and giving him a big voice, often even letting him hijack her whole damn story.

Marvel keeps refusing to let Lorna be her own character with her own amazing stories told, new relationships developed, her own spotlight that has nothing to do with this toxic relationship she’s had with this specific man that executives and editors and writers working at Marvel can’t stop nutting over.

And you know what?

Harley’s Success Could Be Polaris’

Harley Quinn is popular and succeeding right now in spite of setbacks like throwing out her harlequin theme. As said, “Harley Quinn’s” popularity comes because Joker isn’t forced into her stories and dragging her down. In fact, during the whole “rebirth,” the initial Suicide Squad stories where the Joker connection was played up most are actually the least liked.

The same applies with Lorna. Aside from some Austen moments, the great majority of full-bore Polaris fans do not fan over her because of Havok. They’re fans because of her mental health difficulties. Or her support of mutant rights issues when treated well. Or her history and subsequent development as a survivor of the Genoshan genocide. Or her place within the broad Magnus family, or so many other things.

Polaris is an awesome badass with many layers of complexity and massive amounts of untapped potential. What’s happening with Harley Quinn demonstrates that even if Lorna was a pale imitation of her full self, she would still be immensely popular as long as Marvel stopped dicking her over by forcing Havok on her and treating her like she’s “beneath” him.

Hell, we see that right now with Gifted. That version of Polaris isn’t really the full, true Lorna, it’s just one aspect and interpretation of her. It’s more faithful than what Marvel tends to do with her, but it’s still not fully her. And in spite of that, she’s the most popular character on the show. She’s more popular than Havok was in the films.

Lorna couldn’t just be as successful as Harley, she could be more successful. She has decades of history to draw from. Decades of fandom. Immense untapped potential. And a real, proper focus on her would be something more than what DC does for Harley, giving Lorna an edge.

The only thing standing in Lorna’s way is old, awful, entrenched fanboy biases against her at Marvel. Any argument made by anyone at Marvel along the lines of “she’s not popular enough” or “she’s not enough of a character” or anything like that is just people at Marvel trying to justify their bias.

Harley Quinn started out as a minor supporting character for Joker’s stories and look where she is now. Lorna didn’t even start out as that. She started as her own character and got turned into a minor supporting character for Havok’s stories.

If DC can do great things for Harley, then Marvel sure as hell can do them for Lorna too. They just have to care and stop making excuses.

#polaris #lorna dane #x-men #marvel #harley quinn #dc comics #havok #joker

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1rosex · 6 years

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BTS Reaction to being their crush’s bias

Request: Hey I saw that you did a scenario where bts finds out they aren’t you bias and was wondering if you could do one where they find out they are your bias? Thank you!

Masterlist

A/N I didn't know if you wanted the reader to be their s/o or not but I decided it made it more sense if theyre just friends but have a crush on them? I hope thats okay ^^`

Jin

Jin had finally returned from the world tour he had taken and you had been dying to see him. As soon as you received news that he had arrived, you two had arranged to hang out. So now you were sitting cross legged on the bed trying to open a bag of popcorn while Jin tried to get YouTube to work on the television.

"Jin its fine if we don't see your performances right now.. I can just watch them later." You insisted as he failed to set up once more. He stood up and put his hands on his hips while turning to look at you.

"Are you joking? No way! I want to be right here with you so I can see how surprised you are to see my handsome face on tv." He said as you finally tore the bag open and sent popcorn flying everywhere.

"... Right. You do that." You said slowly before picking the pieces up and eating them. Jin just stared at you before going back to setting it up. Truth was he knew that you looked at him when they performed, and he could only hope he'd see you do it again since he had a crush on you for like.. Forever. You were halfway through the bag when Jin finally got YouTube to work, cheering and clapping his hands excitedly as he sat besides you and started to steal some popcorn. You sat and watched their performances, awed by the band. You still couldn't believe you were friends with someone of such a popular band, they were so incredibly talented. You realized that Jin had suddenly gotten silent and took your eyes off the screen to see him smiling at you.

"What?" You asked while taking a handful of popcorn into your mouth.

"So who's your favorite?" Jin asked. You slowed your chewing, considering your options. Either you tell the truth and risk fueling his ego even more, or you lie and damage it. You swallowed and made your decision. "Honestly? You're my bias."

Jin gasped dramatically and fanned himself, making a bunch of exaggerated facial expressions before sending you a flying kiss.

"I knew you couldn't resist my charms, I truly am talented and not to mention good looking."

"Dont make me take it back”

Namjoon

You were sitting on the couch in the living room of the boys dorm, watching their performances with all of them. They had recently finished their tour in America and had invited you over to watch a rewind of their stages with them, of course you had to accept. You could barely focus on the actual show when all of the members were talking over each other, saying how Jungkook sung that note well or how Jin was behind a few steps, followed by retorts of how he was perfectly in sync.

"Guys can you be quiet? Y/N Probably cant even hear our song!" Namjoon scolded.

"Just cause you're her bias doesnt mean you can shush all of us!" Jungkook yelled out while the other members all muttered and nodded in agreement. Namjoon looked at them in surprise and then at you.

"What.. No I'm not... Am I?" He asked, looking legitimately confused. You honestly thought he knew. You laughed as the others all looked at you to await your answer.

"I thought it was obvious? Yeah, you're my bias." Once you said that, Namjoon covered his face and looked away so you wouldn't see him blushing. Jimin immidiately poked fun at him for getting embarrassed but Namjoon was too busy smiling at the fact that he was your bias to care.

"Stop poking me Jimin, maybe you'd be their bias too if you were the tallest."

Yoongi

That morning you woke up early to your phone ringing right in your ear. You answered the phone half asleep, not even knowing who it was until you heard Yoongi's voice on the other line asking you if you wanted to accompany him to practice. You sleepily agreed before hanging up, getting ready and dropping by later in the day.

"I mean yeah. Yoongi's my bias." You admitted to Namjoon who had started up a conversation during their break.

Yoongi, who had been trying to take a drink, choked on his water when he heard you and broke out into a coughing fit. You looked over at him in concern as he coughed a couple more times and cleared his throat, waving his hand around to signal that he was okay.

"I am? I mean- yeah. Of course I am." He coughed a final time and looked away so you couldn't see him blushing. The rest of the practice, Yoongi couldn't help but get nervous. He did have a major crush on you and the fact that you biased him only made him even more nervous.. But you can fully expect him to use this against you. One day you might not want to do something with him and he'll just give you a knowing look that you can't resist.

"...Not even for your bias?"

J-Hope

You didn't know why you had agreed to playing Truth or Dare with Hoseok and his friends, you knew you were gonna suffer. Yet here you were, watching Jin complete his dare of trying not to laugh for a minute straight, only for Jimin's aegyo to send him over the edge with laughter and make everyone scream with cringe. At least it was temporary, unlike Jungkook whom had to yell for the remainder of the game thanks to Namjoon's dare.

"Y/N, TRUTH OR DARE?" Jungkook yelled at you, making you jump.

This could possibly be the most vital decision you were going to make in your life. Either you pick dare and risk having to do some crazy stunt for the members entertainment, or you pick truth and risk being asked something revealing that they'll never let you live down. You swallowed nervously, deciding you preferred verbal embarrassment over doing something physically ridiculous.

"Truth." You answered. Jungkook thought for a second, then his face lit up.

"WHO'S YOUR BIAS??"

Oh no. This was it. All seven members cheered at Jungkook's choice in question before leaning in to await your answer. You looked at all of their faces, from Taehyung's sweet smile and Jin winking to bribe you into picking him, then to Hoseok's bright grin. You sighed, pressing your lips together before pointing to Hoseok as your bias. The dorm interuppted into chaos once more. They all attacked Hobi which was busy with screaming with both excitement that his crush had just called him their bias, and fear that the members were all currently crowding around him.

"I'm sorry my good looks are too much for Y/N, don't attack me!"

Jimin

"Y/N!" Jimin called out to you while you were eating on the couch, watching BTS' choreography to Go Go.

You looked up with a noodle sticking out of the corner of your mouth, quickly slurping it up. ".. Yes?"

"You're watching Go Go without me I told you to waiiiit." He whined before taking a seat besides you and settling his own bowl of ramen noodles in his lap. You laughed and wiped your mouth.

"I'm sorry, you took too long." You two had been friends for a long time, but you'd been lacking a lot of quality time with him. Jimin had been so busy with the new album coming out that he didn't even time to reply to messages sometimes, so when he finally got a break you immidiately asked him to hang out.

"Your outfits and dance moves to this dance are so cute. Omg, look at Taehyung." You smiled when you saw him take the spotlight. Jimin looked up from his bowl of noodles, staring at you with puppy dog eyes.

"Y/N I can not believe you, I am Park Jimin, your best friend, the man whom has been at your side through thick and thin, the groups mochi, yet you compliment Kim Taehyung!" He put his hand on his chest dramatically, pretending to be hurt. Truth was though,, the guy was crushing on you. Big time.

"Chill Jimin, I was just kidding! You know you're my bias." You smiled, and Jimin looked like he had just been shot. He turned into a giggly mess and looked away, he didn't actually expect you to say that.

"Wait, really?"

Taehyung

"Dude." Taehyung said, rolling over and shining his phone light into your face.

"Taehyung I'm trying to sleep." You muttered tiredly, opening your eyes to look at him. Taehyung had barely gotten back from his MAMA performance a day ago, and not knowing when you two could hang out again you'd asked him to come over. But then it started snowing, a lot. Taehyung complained about the cold until you finally told him to just sleep over and you two built a blanket fort. But you had ended up getting sleepy, though Taehyung didn't seem to be sleeping anytime soon.

"Do you think the fans like me?" He asked. You frowned, rubbing the sleepiness from your eyes before propping yourself onto your elbow.

"Of course they do Tae.. Why are you asking?" You said as he turned his phone back to him and then turned it off, covering you two in darkness.

"I don't know.. Just doubtful, I guess." He said. Sometimes Taehyung would confide in you with his feelings, and even though it was late and you were tired, you always heard him out.

"Are you serious? You're Kim freaking Taehyung, BTS' visual, their sweet boy, a caring bean, a meme, the one with the box smile, the one who won most handsome face, the one with a laugh that plEASES THE GODS." You could go on but Taehyung cut you off by hitting you with his pillow, laughing. "You didn't let me finish! And, and you're my bias." You added. Taehyung was glad the lights were off so you couldn't see him blushing at your words.

"Thank you, Y/N."

Jungkook

You and Jungkook were walking around town going shopping, something you had missed for a long time. Jungkook's schedule made it hard for you two to have time for each other, you only ever had time for the occasional text or a call if you were really lucky. But with Jungkook having a break from his schedule, you took the oppurtunity to go out and do something together. Jungkook was just as excited- if not more, to finally be spending the day with you. He refused to admit it, but he had started developing feelings for you and being away for so long was torture.

"Y/N look I'm Hoseok." Jungkook said before pulling a beanie over his head like Hoseok was always seen wearing them. You laughed and shook your head at him.

"Aww poor Hoseok, leave your members alone." You had just finished saying your sentence when Jungkook turned to look at you, his brown eyes wide.

"Why are you defending my hyungs and not the golden maknae?" He asked you. "I thought I was your one and only, your friend, your comrade, partner in crime, the one you choose over anyone else, YOUR PICO DE GALLO, but I guess I was wrong. My own best friend biases Hoseok over me." Jungkook dramatically clutched his chest and sobbed. You didn’t even know what the heck ‘pico de gallo’ meant. (it’s a Spanish dish but can also be a saying for close friends- at least where i’m from lmao)

"Noo, Jungkook, you're my bias!" You insisted while coming up to him, he looked at you in surprise,

"Am I really?"

"No, my bias is Yoongi."

"Are you serious??"

"I'm kidding, it's you."

"STOP CONFUSING ME."

You laughed at his expression. "Okay, no I'm serious. You're actually my bias." Jungkooks face lit up again, hoping he didn't look as excited as he actually felt.

"Oh uh.. O-Of course I am I mean.. who wouldn’t fall for this talented and handsome face right?”

I do not own any gifs

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cyanwings · 6 years

Note

i'm sorry you aren't feeling good, my bean! 33, 20, 18, 2, and 1

@jimmy-valmer

It’s okay! I mean, it sucks big time cause I feel like a truck ran over me from the body aches but I’ve handled worse. I’m a WARRIOR!!!

ON TO THE MIGHTY MEMESS~!!!

ANIME QUESTIONS MEME - Accepting!

1. best anime you’ve watched

So for the record, I’m excluding “Avatar: The Last Airbender” & (2003) “Teen Titans” shows cause people consider them animes when they’re only anime influenced so they’re out. But, this is SO hard! It’s like picking my children, it just feels impossible to do! Though, if I HAD to pick just one, it would have to be…… ( 2003) Kino’s Journey!

Why? Well, let’s ride right into the world of “Kino’s Journey” or in it’s original title “Kino no Tabi.”

“ The world is not beautiful, there fore it is.”

Let’s start with the story, which tells of the journey of a traveler named Kino and their motorcycle, Hermes, while they visit a long range of countries as they meet different people along the way. The actual fact is: there isn’t one solid story but 12 short stories that link together not by episode order but by events. And yet the fact that each one of this stories manages to give a deeper meaning than the whole plots from many animes amazes me till no end! Kino finds herself in the midst of these societies - some of which have downright appalling practices. Each episode approaches a theme of society, like censoring, violence, communication problems, right or wrong, the ability some people have to bite the hand that just feds them, and so on. And every time I watch each one, I found myself enjoying this series more than I should have.

As Kino travels throughout the world and becomes acquainted with the people who inhabit it, it becomes clear that each of her encounters is essentially a separate journey into the labyrinth that is the human psyche to explore one of the many elements that make it up. The issues touched upon in the series ranges from the tendencies of humans to blindly believe in prophecies to the consequences of not having a self-conscious.

There is a wide range of characters as expected from an anime that tells about travels all over the world. While some of them are forgettable, some of them also stay in your mind. Although it is clear that neither Kino nor Hermes is the main focus of the series, together they play an essential role in its series.

In terms of being a likeable character, Kino has become my favorite anime character ever! They inspire me in so many ways and I’m always glued to the screen every time their role comes into play. Although they appear apathetic at first, they’re a caring and understanding person. Kino travels through different countries to experience their customs and understand the citizens, but they never stay longer than three days, as they’re afraid of settling down, and would decrease of being a traveler. They’re also intelligent, skillful, extremely wise for someone so young and still as unpredictable as a teen could be. Though not fond of killing, they will do so if necessary without feeling remorse. Especially, towards those who attack them or the innocent. Kino has truly become one of the most unique characters I’ve ever seen.

Hermes, Kino’s talking motorcycle, acts as the perfect companion to his owner. Not only are his conversations with Kino very enjoyable to listen to due to the his humour, the series also allows for further exploration on his character. I won’t lie that I found it odd that we were suppose to just roll with the fact that he speaks but as the show grows over time, you do learn to accept it and that’s not the most unusual thing you’ll be seeing in the series either. He’s also the closest thing that Kino has to a friend and it just makes their relationship heartwarming a lot of the time. In addition, considering the theme of the series is the nature of humanity, his presence as a non-human makes their discussions even more interesting. You have no idea if he’s truly real or just in Kino’s head. But, whatever the case may be, he’s a fun character to journey with!

The dub is honestly one of the best that I’ve heard and I’m usually REALLY picky when it comes to English audio in anime. It was done at A.D.V films, which are the people responsible for other great dubs like “Princess Tutu”, and they do an AMAZING job!

Kelli Collins voicing Kino was the highlight of the entire dub! Her acting glues you into her role to her character and you’re just amazed of how well she fits the Kino. Especially, giving the young traveler a sense of maturity to such a young teen. It’s a shame she hasn’t been active since then and didn’t return for the reboot of the series. ( Even though it was a disaster so maybe it was for the best. ) Kino’s voice actress succeeds as the perfect person to voice such a outstanding character and how she brings her to life. I honestly can’t even picture anyone else to play the role but her. Hermes on the other hand is a hit or miss with viewers. Cynthia Martinez voicing Hermes comes off with a cartoonish boyish voice who I could definitely see annoying it’s viewers. But to me? It honestly works! The way Hermes asks certain questions and their responses makes sense that they act childish or ask very out-looking questions of the situations at hand. Not not say he’s immature. He’s actually the voice of reason but, Cynthia shows great promise with the role. And you’ll see why once you go into this series head on.

Overall this series holds a special place in my heart. It doesn’t have that nasty fan service or anything too over the top like a Shōnen show but, it helped me get a better understanding on how humanity works and even thinks at times. In life, we don’t know which path to take but that’s the journey of it. You just get up and travel to find out what’s up ahead for you. To see the world for what it is with all it’s good and bad parts. Kino searches for life’s answers, life’s questions, and the interpretations connected to them. Destination is a state of mind; Drift along for the ride~!

2. worst anime you’ve watched

Oh gawd, this is just torture! Just when I think I can finally be rid of trash like this I have to go back and look in the bin again lmao

Let’s see…. I think I would have to say…. “ Master of Martial Hearts.” Why didn’t I say the famous “School Days?” I could but I wanted to do a different hate this time since this one made me beyond pissed off! “School Days” at least had the main lead get what’s coming to him cause we all know the douche bad deserved what was coming to him so I was fine with the insane out come. But this? HELL NO!

I found this series out by amazing reviewer, JesuOtaku, back when Youtube was starting to get popular and I always agreed with her reviews. I’m SO glad I saw her review first before stumbling upon this nasty series. First, we got under aged girls, and women in general, getting their clothes completely ripped apart as they fight one another cause why not? Screw plot! And it’s just an endless scenes of just wtf??!! I didn’t watch the series but I saw enough of it through her long review. AND…what pissed me off the most is the ending. Dear gawd! THE ENDING! This series only has 5 episodes but once you check out the last one? It deserves two middle fingers straight at it cause F*CK THIS SERIES!! No seriously, don’t even check it cause it’s just horrible. Just awful!! It’s just the worst anime to me and always will be!

18. favorite villain

This is gonna sound strange but I instantly KNEW who my favorite villain was gonna be and I couldn’t be more ready! When there’s a great hero there’s also a great villain. Out of the horrible characters did I choose? Johan from (2004) “Monster.”

“ There’s nothing special about being born. Not a thing. Most of the universe is just death, nothing more. In this universe of ours, the birth of a new life on some corner of our planet is nothing but a tiny, insignificant flash. Death is a normal thing. So why live? ”

–Johan

The story focuses on Kenzo Tenma, a young Japanese doctor working at the Eisler Memorial Hospital during in Germany the 80′s. He is a very skilled highly brain surgeon. However, Tenma grows increasingly dissatisfied with the political bias of the hospital for treating it’s patients, and seizes his chance to change things after a strange massacre brings the twins Johan and Anna Liebert into his hospital.

Johan has a gunshot wound to the head and Anna keeps muttering about killing. Tenma decides to operate on Johan instead of a politician who arrived afterwards. Johan is saved, but the politician dies. After this Tenma loses his social standing, lost his promotion, basically everything, and not soon after that the twins escape. The top heads of the hospital are found dead the same night the twins escape. Tenma is then promoted to chef of surgeon.

After that the story advances to nine years later. A known criminal is found on the street, hit by a car. He comes under the care of Dr. Tenma, who observes him muttering about a “Monster.” Tenma extends his kindness to that criminal, and thus the criminal begins to open up to his doctor.

Following his trail to the construction site of a half finished building near the hospital, Tenma finds the man. The man, who has developed a sort of doctor-patient friendship with Dr. Tenma, warns him against coming closer, and pleads with him to run away. Tenma refuses, however, and the identity of the man holding the gun pointed at the criminal in the abandoned parking garage is revealed to be the boy whose life Tenma had saved nine years ago - Johan Liebert. Johan shoots the criminal, tells Tenma that he could never kill the man who had saved his life, and then walks off into the night while Tenma is still too shocked to stop him. I’m not gonna spoil anymore to the plot cause it’ll ruin the experience but WOW! What a series!

On the surface, Johan is a well-mannered, charismatic and compassionate young man. He possesses a favorable of traits and can easily overwhelm individuals with his seemingly flawless nature, as others describes him as being not of this world. This makes it easy for him to make new allies and manipulate them into doing various deeds for him. With such skill in creating this facade of perfection and pureness, Johan can hide his true motives with ease.

Johan delivers destruction and suffering to those who happen to fall prey to his schemes. Johan exhibits psychopathic tendencies. For example, most of his murders, both in childhood and adulthood, have been premeditated and calculated.

Johan often shows a complete disregard for life by pointing to his forehead, inviting Dr. Tenma to shoot him.

He also has a tendency to make his victims experience the worst possible loss and suffering rather than actually killing them himself;

Everyone NEEDS to check out “ Monster ” cause it does not disappoint! Even just check out just for it’s villain and the amazing english dub! Trust me, it’ll be one incredible wild ride!

20. favorite costume/character design:

My girl, Mina Ashido from “My Hero Academia” / “Boku no Hero Academia”!

“The old you’s not going anywhere with that emo look on your face! If you overcome that gloomy self of yours… let me know. Or else I’ll start spreading rumors about high school debut man.”

—

Mina Ashido

33. most underrated anime in your opinion

Since I already talked about “ Kino’s Journey” & “ Monster”, I’ll decide another great underrated anime people need to see and that’s “ Princess Tutu.”

“ May those who follow their fate be granted happiness; may those who defy it be granted glory.“ - Miss Edel

In a fairy tale come to life, the clumsy, out-going, and gentle Ahiru (“Duck” in the English Dub) seems like an unlikely protagonist. In reality, Ahiru is just as magical as the talking cats and crocodiles that inhabit her town—for Ahiru really is a duck! Transformed by the mysterious Drosselmeyer into a human girl, Ahiru soon learns the reason for her existence. Using her magical egg-shaped pendant, Ahiru can transform into Princess Tutu—a beautiful and talented ballet dancer whose dances relieve people of the turmoil in their hearts. With her newfound ability, Ahiru accepts the challenge of collecting the lost shards of her prince’s heart, for long ago he had shattered it in order to seal an evil raven away for all eternity.

Princess Tutu is a tale of heroes and their struggle against fate. Their beliefs, their feelings, and ultimately their actions will determine whether this fairy tale can reach its "happily ever after.”

The title may seem off putting to a lot since it sounds like some girly anime but don’t judge a book by it’s cover~! This series has so much going for it and it’s honestly just outstanding! It may be predictable at the beginning ( Had the same trouble with the first season of “Avatar: The Last Airbender” ) but, it becomes something you just never expected; A complex and tragedy story.

You honestly feel for every single one of these characters once their parts are given into play. And the fact that they use real classical music that compliments the dance scenes so well done. You feel the dramatic effect once our main leads come into the spotlight. The intense just rises from the music and for the dubbing too. I said back in my “Kino’s Journey” part of the ask that this was dubbed by A.D.V. Films and it’s one of my favorites ever! It’s not just one or two actors that shine, every single person portrays their characters with flying colors. I was just amazed of how incredibly well done they did!

I could go on and on about the characters but they’re all such a surprise that I rather not spoil it. This is genuinely a heartwarming show to experience for yourself. Classical music, beautifully choreographed dances, and memorable characters make for an experience worth having in all of Princess Tutu’s world. A modern fairy tale for the ages.

#jimmy-valmer #princess tutu #kino's journey #kino no tabi #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #mina ashido #ashido mina #naoki urasawa's monster #johan liebert #anime

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drmyler · 3 years

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Kafka - Psychoanalysis

Kafka, Metamorphosis a Psychoanalytical View

Dr Stephen F Myler PhD

Abstract:

Franz Kafka in 1916 wrote a short novella called Metamorphosis (1. Bantam Edition 2004) a book of immense psychological and insightful nightmare into the human condition. Here we will exam Kafka's masterpiece from a psychoanalytical perspective to see that this work was an insightful self examination of depression, mental health and the role of carers when love turns to loathing. To begin our journey for the non-reader of this famous text we will give a brief outline and then turn to the specific role of psychoanalytic insight from Freudian to Burns and beyond.

Introduction:

Kafka was born in 1883 a middle class Jewish boy, introverted, shy and inadequate, believed to be a result of a critical father, (2. Letter to his Father 1919) he was later educated in Prague in a German University however he went on in his spare time to write many works of outstanding literature. Here we are not going to delve into detailed life but satisfy ourselves with a small picture of the man as writer. Kafka was very driven and wrote daily through the night with a dedicated passion. Today he might be seen as OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Behaviour) prone to perfectionism. It is his perfectionist emotional driver that made his literature something very special.

Kafka wrote Metamorphosis in 1916 as a short novella about a young man who was the stalwart of the family, supporting an out of work critical father, a doting mother and childlike sister, in which our hero, Gregor Samsa was not popular at work and under daily stress of travel and deadlines to meet for which he felt a losing battle. In the beginning of the book he awakes from a troubling dream to find he has in fact turned into an ugly giant beetle his mind trapped in an alien body. From this beginning Gregor begins to explore his new limitations and narrow world view, his sight becomes dim, he cannot move without constant pain and great effort. His family are dependent on Gregor going to work, earning their keep and supporting their needs when suddenly he cannot no longer act in this role. His father is disgusted, his mother stricken and his younger sister while becoming his carer is repulsed by this new version of her brother. As time passes and he does not return to his old self – the family must make new plans to survive and now see him as their burden (roles reversed). In the beginning Gregor thought this was just a temporary situation that would soon pass and he would re-uptake his old life and continue forward. However in the end there is no solution and suffers a lonely eventual death.

In writing the following psychoanalytical analysis I have not read the many introductions, essays and critical insights of other writers. This was purposefully done to avoid contamination of my thinking process in treating Gregor as my patient in a psychoanalytical setting. I did not want to have the bias of others opinions to my way of seeing the text as the only evidence of the patients mental health problem.

The Patient:

Like any new psychological patient to the clinic a first one hour session would be usually conducted in two parts – the first – why have you come to see me? The second the clients ability to vent (tell their story in their own words) and so set the scene for further sessions. Lets imagine Gregor's typical answer to why have you come here.

Gregory: My family is very dependent on me to support them but lately I have been feeling very stressed by work and home alike. I had a very bad dream a few weeks ago and woke up in a deluded state in which I found it impossible to get our of bed. I just felt overwhelmed with exhaustion and the loss of will to keep going on with my miserable life. It was like I was some ugly bug that everyone despised and yet took for granted. All they want to do is squash my passion for life and replace it with their needs.

Psychoanalyst: It sounds very much as if you are stressed and reached what me might call a point of exhaustion – this means your energy has been depleted both physically and mentally. So to summarise – you are depressed right now from the burden of work and a non-supportive family environment and you feel you have given up trying to be the one who supports everyone else?

Gregory: Yes, it is like I was a donkey with burden I could no longer carry.

Psychoanalyst: Tell me a little of your background? (second part - venting)

Gregory: I have a very critical, controlling father who tries to dominate the household, however he is unemployed right now and his health has deteriorated through becoming lazy and irritable. My mother cowers to him and goes along with his demands even when unreasonable, I have a younger sister – she is just finishing her education but has not found any real outlet for her abilities just yet, she is kind and sweet but very nieve about the world at large. At work my supervisor while pleasant enough but he is also under pressure from our boss who like my father is controlling and micro manages our every move. This means you feel you are being scrutinized constantly and found lacking. I have to travel a lot for my work and often come home late and exhausted but then am expected to be there for the family as the main stay of their comforts. I do not have time for relationships and I am probably not a very good catch for any girl who might have any interest in me beyond the obvious. At home things have changed now that I have been fired and lost my income. My sister has started to care for me more and tries constantly to rescue me from my mood swings, however my mother has just fell apart and cries insistently about her poor boy yet shy away from actually helping me. As for my father he is even more disgusted by me than ever as I forced him to go out and find work, he even took in some lodgers to help make ends meet and so the burden has passed to my mother and sister to keep the household clean and fed. We have had some cooks and cleaners but they have mostly left because they refuse to have anything to do with me. I cannot really think of much else to tell you – but at least I feel I managed to get it all out.

Psychoanalyst: I think that gives me quite a lot to think about Gregor and you have been very clear and systematic in the way you have explained the background. Tell me how are you actually feeling right now?

Gregory: A little relieved to have finally explained myself and someone listened without a sneer on their face or laughing at me. Thank you for that. In general I know that everyday I feel sad and tired by life – I just want to lay down and sleep – that somehow when I wake up everything will be normal again – that I can function and have some sort of life.

Psychoanalyst: Well we have had our time today Gregor, an hour can pass very quickly the first visit. I hope to see you are least once a week for an hour, in the meantime I have a little homework exercise for you to complete for me. A one page biography of your family, where you grew up, your education, relationships and the current here and now situation. I know you have told me some of this already but it will help save some time in sessions by having a short version of your life so far. Please send to me via email before our next session so that I can read and analyse the content before you come. Here is my card and details. If at anytime you feel you are in crisis and need me – please call for an earlier appointment.

Gregory: Thank you Doctor, I will see you same time next week.

Psychoanalytical Analysis of the First Session:

For insurance purposes the analyst is forced to write a psychiatric number and diagnosis. This labelling is not a reflection of the true nature of the mental health problem but merely a forced situation in order to get paid. In Gregor's case – Clinical Depression DSM V 296.3.

In reality a psychological outcome may have been Reactive Depression to stress at both home and work leading to a lack of everyday cognitive functioning in both thought and behaviour.

Clearly in this case – depression is the key element from signs of mental exhaustion, a sense of hopelessness and helplessness from the role reversal of stalwart breadwinner to helpless victim in need of rescuing by his sister in particular – the constant disappointment to both his parents and rejection of his work colleagues. At his stage we do not have enough data to surmise the underlying unconscious drives that might be fueling his depressive state other than the external pressures of family and work. In further sessions the need will be met from a more in depth scrutinizing of his emotional world and inner conflicts. He clearly feels alone in his burden although the sister is obviously doing her mother's duty of care. The client mentioned a bad dream – this can be further pursued for unconscious motivations.

Further Sessions:

Over 20 or more sessions – Gregor's analogy of being an ugly beetle are further explored and his relationships with both family and work – more importantly his feelings about himself and his depressive state. It also became clear that his family were now neglecting his everyday needs for nutritious food, care and comfort. They in fact have become physically violent towards him causing him to further withdraw into his delusional world where he feels he is nothing more than an ugly beetle that should be stamped upon. Risk of suicide has now become evident in his demeanour. His appearance shows he is not looking after his ablutions, clothing is dirty and unkempt and he has lost considerable weight. He was also becoming lethargic in that he no longer cared what happened to him as long as this constant pain would cease (pain being mental anguish). His sister although dutiful in looking after him has lost heart in him getting better and so now only is a functional caregiver as opposed to a empathetic one. His biography homework showed that his father was not only controlling but bitter in that he lost a business owing considerable money to Gregor's employer who now expected him to pay off his fathers debts through a reduced salary for his own work putting considerable burden on him to support the family at home. The mother was ashamed of the home situation and was too weak to stand up to her husband in any matters of economy or otherwise. The sister was in the past spoiled and now resented her reduced situation and blamed Gregor for being sick. Again adding to his feelings of alienation and being alone.

Sadly Gregor died after the end of the sessions from self-neglect – basically willing his life to cease as he saw no longer any purpose to it. His father had found new employment, the mother felt relieved to see her son no longer in this life suffering and the sister finally felt free of her own burden that being her brother. While psychoanalysis would have hoped for a different outcome – the book itself determined the ending that we have to accept.

Conclusion:

While Franz Kafka meant his novella of Metamorphosis to be a comic tragedy of a wasted life it springs out at any educated reader in the art of psychoanalysis as a perfect example of chronic depression and futility. Those in this delusional state often contemplate suicide although mostly via ideation (I think it but don't), however self neglect is very common trait that leads to slow death from a lack of self care. When you have a non-supportive family, where their needs are being thwarted by your mental state – then further rejection can cause a spiralling effect of deeper resentment about your own part in the downfall of your mind. Many depressives play victim (3. Berne 1960's) inviting others to rescue them – when in fact they need to rescue themselves – but in the end they become their own persecutor and further victimize themselves to that bitter ending of death.

In real life via treatment for depression a sense of purpose is sought from the client in that he can see a new fresh change to his circumstances despite the battle of a non-supportive family and hostile work environment that is all to common in today's economy. In Gregor's case over time he would have explored his past traumas and realized the underlying demons that led to his lack of self assurance and efficacy to find a new solution to his mood.

Summery:

This paper was an exercise in psychoanalysis from a famous work of literature and reflects the art of the analyst who tries to understand the underlying concepts of the unconscious mind in creating monsters from our own imagination to battle with when we reach that point of exhaustion both physically and mentally called – depression.

References:

1. Kafka F. 1915 – Metamorphosis – Bantam Edition 2004

2. Kafka F. 1919 – Letter to his Father – Bantam Ed 2004

3. Bernes E. 1960's – Transactional Analysis – various volumes.

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rqs902 · 4 years

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this became just a random summary of my thoughts on mainly yu gengyin (with other kids sprinkled in lol) throughout various episodes of season 2, which may or may not be presented in any sort of logical flow or order, just a warning....

i feel like yu gengyin is normally a calm boy, pretty direct, but keeps his composure. but this pose right here, i can relate to his contempt for zhou wen HAHAHHAHHAHAAHAHA HES SO DONE HAHHAHAHA

i havent even started the episode yet but i saw they’re gonna perform exo’s wolf and just started LAUGHING HAHHAHAHAHHAHAHA I NEVER HTGOUHT HAHAHH NOT THIS SONG HAHHAHAHHAHA

tbh im totally ok with leo not choosing ygy HAHAHAHAHHAHA no offense to him, but he’s not very good at playing the super idol game, so hopefully ygy can shine stronger elsewhere. i feel like this show doesnt show him enough appreciation yet.

HAHAHAHAH YGY IN THE SAME GROUP AS CXK YES IM THRIVINGGG

suddenly leo’s team got very strong lol

but pyj hating hd still lol.... but its ok they have wmt even tho they got a bunch of new kids and the most useless new kid lol.....

i was just complaining about lack of ygy but suddenly there are more flashes to ygy on screen lol... amazing... but he does look really nice in this color

WHEN YGY GOT NOMINATED TO BE ELIMINATED MY HEART BROKE

but tbh for the remainder of the ep i more worried about freaking wumuti looking like he was freaking dying gosh he shouldve gone to rest or something, they really didnt need him to keep standing there after he finished performing. freaking muti pulled off an amazing performance despite his condition and as soon as he exited that stage persona, he literally looked like he was so weak and so pale i was like oh gosh let the boy rest!!! ugh but yea i refuse to believe / am in denial that ygy may possibly get eliminated so i am refusing to think about it LOL. anyway now on ep 6 they literally keep giving him screentime. zfz literally saying the purpose of this mission is to “save ygy” and cxk talking about giving ygy a special role in their perf so he can shine ;_; i love friendship

but im not complaining about extra ygy time ehehehheh he looks like a prince for this stage and i love how he’s still smiling brightly throughout the ep and when aya brought up his status of being nominated for elims he was like ‘can you not say it out loud” and it was jokingly and he was smiling but the downward motion he made with his hands, i was like ah he is trying not to cry?

its interesting bc im almost grateful at least now ygy will get some more attention

wow look how stylish wu muti was in 2016

oof watching ep 7 was painful..... it felt like an ultimate low for gengyin, and even tho we all teared up when zfz was eliminated.... it kinda made sense when he was talking about the colors and how he liked his own color so maybe hes just not meant to be in a boy band and i can agree... ahhhh side note fangzhou and yifan’s friendship ahhhh it makes so much sense why they’re still so close today.... even tho im still SO MAD that deng qiang is still here and fangzhou had to leave.... episode 8 was really FINALLY the break that this team as a whole really needed and im SO HAPPY and relieved for them

this entire season has felt like a low for gengyin, like torture for him, and he really hasn’t gotten a break to shine or to feel success and i feel like to be in that kind of a slump for like 2 months??? thats so sad... and im sure that takes a toll on your mental health. but despite it all, despite being passed up for getting chosen for the special stage, he still was rooting for daidai so cutely like the way he used a silly voice to chant “戴隊戴隊” and so wholeheartedly exclaimed “戴戴太感人了~ 媽呀! 唱得快撕裂了你知道嗎’ I mean, honestly he could’ve easily and understandably felt salty that daidai got that opportunity (even tho we all know gengyin has more vocal ability), but he didn’t. it felt like he truly and fully supported his friend and teammate and that already had my heart going oof

BUT THEN. then watching their practice footage and just watching him regain his confidence and then finally FINALLLYY perform like he was truly enjoying being on stage. after 8 freaking episodes, FINALLY its yu gengyin’s time to shine and i am THRIVING!!! ahhhhhhhhhh i literally stopped after their team’s perf to just absorb all the amazing things they said about him, about his vocals and high notes, and about his dancing improving, and about his rapping being so next level for him, and about his stage presence being the best hes been yet. and the comment the teacher made about how yu gengyin’s personality is just so nice and 善良 that he has had difficulty portraying a powerful stage presence and today he finally saw it, and i think he was just so perfect, im so proud and so happy!!!!!! and wow this stage is everything to me. cxk’s stage presence is already so strong (and btw i loved how kunkun so confidently said “ygy is our main vocal. he will no doubt stand on stage very confidently and perform well” -- i LOVE how much faith cxk has in gengyin, despite all the setbacks gengyin’s faced recently) and the choreo - they made it work for them and you could see them work together and i loved the way liu ye just literally SAW gengyin’s confidence. he saw how gengyin was just somehow so handsome on this stage and i think that says a lot about how much someone’s mental state can truly impact their performance. it hurt my heart to hear ygy describing being at risk for elimination for the past 3 weeks as feeling like he was physically weighed down by the immense pressure. he just seemed so tired, but at least within the last 2 eps the show has taken the time to really highlight how gengyin’s been practicing late at night alone, trying not to let down his team mates and really trying to improve himself. (ugh the fact that he had been practicing his high notes secretly all this time but never got to show it until he broke his voice...) But yes, i literally just watched their team’s performance and paused to type this all out and now im gonna go back and watch their whole segment again, because i love seeing yu gengyin’s transformation and this confident side of him. how can you not love his smile (and the way that they captioned this as "yu gengyin’s signature smile” :’)

man ep 8 is like THE time to be a ygy stan bc hes literally thriving and shining and getting all this screen time and attention and its so well-deserved and ive just been waiting 8 eps but we’re finally here :’) and yes its now official that ygy is my bias on this show i cant turn back now hahHHAHAHHA ive invested too many emotions into this child and you best bet i just changed my phone lock screen to also be ygy HAHHAHAHA its actually the top photo from the pic i just pasted above, bc this performance, that SMILE is EVERYTHING

but also on a darker note, the whole conflict between wu muti and huadi is making me uncomfortable.... honestly i feel bad that ive been hoping their team loses but thats mainly just bc i need deng qiang to get eliminated which would require their team to lose LOL but also this whole thing between muti and huadi is getting out of control and their tempers are p concerning... like tbh we all know huadi has a temper but like muti is firey too and he’s like at a point where he just keeps yelling and being rude so im like theyre both just being rude to each other and its to the point where its starting to affect their team work... oh noo. sigh... from the beginning i thought huadi and muti’s dance styles were so different that they may clash bc theyre both going to try to lead dance practice, but this is way worse, this is their personalities clashing and its much scarier than i expected.

also poor pinlin... man he like got super shafted during the first season imo and now he has to leave season 2 bc of his super serious injury.... ugh seeing his tears of frustration hurt my heart... he has so much talent and deserves more opportunity to show it :( but man his waist injury sounds so bad. the main bright side to all this is zuo qibo getting peer pressured into stepping up as a main vocal and really improving and getting some time to shine too. in season 1, back from when muti was like ‘noo i dont wanna be compared to qibo, hes a good singer’ until now, i dont think we’ve reaaalllyyy gotten too much of an opportunity to appreciate qibo’s vocal abilities because hes not had too much exposure and hes been overshadowed by the kids who have already established their strong vocal abilities. im scared hes under a lot of pressure now, as their leader and main vocal, but im glad hes been doing so well so far, good for him :’) im looking forward to seeing him improve and get more appreciation. i remember he was one of the most popular kids at the end of season 1 (along with cxk and wmt i think?) so i want to believe that he can live up to it. also this is random, but his visuals are really growing on me, like i can see him as a visual now and i think he looked really good this ep!!! to me visuals are cxk wmt zqb djy and maybe also hyf zpl yeeaaaaaaa but i mean ill say again, i just love ygy’s smile :’)

#rants #dont mind me while i wallow in an emotional roller coaster watching a show from 2016 lol

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yeoldontknow · 7 years

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ayo bae it’s time to get lit~

what follows below is an introduction (attack) post for @igot7bangtanbaes, who has dipped her toe into the EXO water and now i would like to drown her. :3

as light of my life Kim Junmyeon once said:

LET’S GET HEATED

when EXO debuted, there originally were 12 members and they were divided into two subgroups: EXO-K and EXO-M. three members have left, so now we are left with an OT9 (but i still cherish the hell out of the past three members, they are important). eight of the members are korean and only one is chinese, so now it is time to meet your new kings. going youngest to oldest (and also because you seem hella hyped for sehun so imma start there)

Oh Sehun

the king of hearts (everyone’s heart tbh)

Name: Oh Sehun

Stage Name: Sehun

DOB: April 12, 1994

Position: (1/2) main rapper, (1/3) lead dancer, occasional vox (least we forget when he sang baek’s part in I Sing For You??)

facts as stated in the GC: maknae of the group, but also a model like he’s a prince from a different time. he often models for louis vuitton and has had spreads in vogue and marie claire, and like...he’s a king. actually, he is the lord to a small plot of land in scotland because his fans are The Most Extra and bought him goddamn Title for his birthday i cannot even. loads of people think he’s really cold and kinda stand-offish because he has the strongest resting bitch face, but he is The Biggest Softie and so Sweet. once got injured during a tour and cried, not because he couldn’t perform or that it hurt but, because he absolutely did not want to let his fans down and felt horrible. dog dad to Vivi, a white fluff made of joy. if you throw vivi replica plushies on stage at him, he will make it a point to collect them all like they are pokemon. dances like an actual rent boy and is overall, an Excellent Bias (im 90% sure this is where you will live but imma keep going to be sure).

Kim Jongin

the king of hell

Name: Kim Jongin

Stage Name: Kai

Birthday: January 14, 1994

Position: (2/3) lead dancer; rapper; vox; visual

a devil/demon here to wreck your life and smile while doing it. tbh, jongin aka nini and kai are two very different people. jongin is a soft boy. he has a silly low laugh that vibrates through his whole body and turns his mouth into a massive circle. he gets shy super easily and is always smiling. loves teddy bears, flower crowns, and fried chicken. is father to three dogs that he calls his children (no subs here just look at the smiles and cry a lot). kai on the other hand is just a torpedo of sexual tension and muscles on his abs where i didn’t know muscles could be. will smirk at you and watch with a grin as you light on fire in the aftermath. once danced so hard he destroyed his shoe. moves his hips like its a gun and you are his target. studied dance for years because that’s all he wants to do, is best friends with SHINee’s taemin. recently started acting because LOOK AT HIS FACE?? like, wow so beautiful. he is art. also super proud of how dark his skin is, which is considered v-dark culturally in korea and hopes that his children will have his skin tone, what a babe.

DO Kyungsoo

the king of souls

Name: DO Kyungsoo

Stage Name: D.O

Birthday: January 12, 1993

Position: main vocalist

nicknamed satansoo because he takes no shit and always looks like he’d happily kill a man if it meant he could have one day of peace. very close with jongin, has a large soft spot for him (jongin may be the only person soo hasn’t actively wanted to slap). called satansoo but actually a Soft Boy; domestic AF. boy cooks (often cooks for the members), loves to read, routinely dates himself, and is very humble and kind. has a smile that can light up the earth with the force of its power. sings like an angel but is also seductive like a demon. rich chocolate vocal tones and a soft speaking voice, amazing actor. out here winning awards for his acting in recent films like boy!!

Park Chanyeol

the king of the chogidab

Name: Park Chanyeol

Stage Name: Chanyeol

Birthday: November 27, 1992

Position (under me): (2/2) main rapper; vocalist; the voice of exo; songwriter!!!; general overall talent

i will do my absolute best to keep this brief. this boy is my ult and i could wax poetic about him until the inevitable heat death of the universe. part of the beagle line with baekhyun and jongdae, cannot sit still nor control his limbs. generally is the no dance line but tries His Best and is so adorable while doing it. might not be able to dance well but does literally everything else. piano? you got it. guitar? he literally played radiohead. moog synthesizer? bought one because he could and thought it would be cool. vocals? allow me to show you his soundcloud. please live and die here. writes songs, is working his way through the athletic alphabet, raps like A Man, famously said ‘you lovin’ the size.’ once said ‘i’m yours’ on a radio station and the entire country got pregnant. overall soft boy who looks like it hurts to laugh, like it causes him physical pain to keep joy inside. amazing with kids.

Kim Jongdae

the king of smiles

Name: Kim Jongdae

Stage Name: Chen

Birthday: May 6, 1992

Position: main vocalist

A TRUE KING OK. part of the beagle line with PCY and baekhyun. when he smiles his face is literally :} = has The Best Mouth. doesn’t think junmyeon is very funny but is simultaneously really soft for him, and will usually be among the first to praise him. is actually married to minseok - super close and have the most beautiful friendship. a literal actual ball of energy, loud as shit, and usually yelling WHY?? when he has no liquid left in his body and is sweating out his soul, he will still scream. insanely strong, stable vocals. i repeat: insanely. strong. vocals. also, coming hard for dance-line. part of EXO sub unit EXO-CBX with baekhyun and minseok.

Byun Baekhyun

king of hoeing (idk ask @kpopfanfictrash)

Name: Byun Baekhyun

Stage Name: Baekhyun

Birthday: May 6, 1992

Position: main vocalist; also coming for the dance line

proudly gets to hold the position of tallest member of EXO-CBX. auditioned at the same time as jongdae and is know for his enthusiastic dancing. jongin once said that when he saw baek dancing it was a mess, and baek confirmed this by saing ‘it looked like mollusks dancing.’ body is double jointed and when he extends his arms it, they look like lightning bolts; thinks this might also be a disease but is ok with it. voice of literal, actual angels. looks better in smoky eye makeup than most models and is king of selfies. literally taught fans how to take a selfie. once was on instagram live and made me stare at a damn wall for 30 minutes before playing yixing’s solo album.

Zhang Yixing

king of the entire universe

Name: Zhang Yixing

Stage Name: Lay

Birthday: October 7, 1991

Position: (3/3) lead dancer; vocalist; light of everyone’s life

even if you aren’t a soft person, you are soft for yixing. it’s one of the laws of the universe, you will always be soft for him. im going to raise an unpopular opinion and announce that i often find i prefer watching yixing dance over everyone else. when his body moves, it’s perfect into a literal art and i cry every time. the last remaining chinese member of EXO and must be protected at. all. costs. was a child actor in china before wanting to become an idol. if he could play any character in a movie, he’d like to play a dinosaur or the villain. was once told that if he wanted to improve his korean he needed to get a girlfriend. writes his own songs and plays guitar. his solo debut was the highest sales of a solo album in south korea, can you even believe. generally made of sunshine and light and love and MUST BE PROTECTED.

Kim Junmyeon

king of money

Name: Kim Junmyeon

Stage Name: Suho

Birthday: May 22, 1991

Position: leader of EXO; vocalist

trained the longest of any member! trained for seven (7) years before making his debut with EXO, resulting in him training with most of SHINee. makes awful dad jokes and has an oddball sense of humour, but we cherish him anyway. secretly keeping abs beneath his soft tee shirts. nicknamed junmoney because he treated a lot of the members in their early days when they didn’t have money, and now they all think he’s rich. the doorman at his apartment calls him Handsome Man. messiest member but also among the most humble. always makes sure to thank everyone at awards ceremonies, refusing to leave anyone who helped them out. great at math. has a solo song called curtain that literally brought me and most of the people i know to tears within the first 90 seconds.

Kim Minseok

king of kitties

Name: Kim Minseok

Stage Name: Xiumin

Birthday: March 26, 1990

Position: vocals; sometimes rap; moving up on the dance line

oldest member of EXO while simultaneously refusing to age. honestly, he has not aged at all. he might be a wizard. hugely popular in korea and is also holding abs of steel beneath his soft tee shirts. member of EXO subunit EXO-CBX. literally can rock any hair colour. currently getting his Ph.D and will be called Doctor Kim, i die. a general soft boy who is also a cat, but WILL WRECK YOU. boy is a pimp and will come for your ass if he detects even a moment of weakness.

WELCOME TO THE FAMILY GIRL.

#exo for tyler #why did this take so long and its still not even that great #im so tired

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bunnyjoyce-blog · 7 years

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The following was written Aug 1, 2014 after the UK tour. I guess it’s pretty obvious that at the time I still didn’t like Duvay replacing Ashley. XD

A buddy of mine and I have been talking about the workshop version of Starlight Express. She had seen some videos at some point in time, and since she is a faNational, she was excited that Hashamoto and Espresso had gotten more to do in those days. So, apparently, Espresso was supposed to go with a carriage who wore glasses. (Yay for meganekkos everywhere!) Before he pairs off with her, he was approached by Ashley, but Espresso states that his mother warned him about smokers.

Me: "And yet another missed opportunity to give Ashley her own subplot. Combine that warning with "maybe smokers might rate an occasional smile" and add a few choice scenes, and we might never have heard of Duvay." Cool Lady of Awesomeness: "I like that idea. Maybe they could've combined her and Rusty's story somehow as the melody from her part is used in his missing song? I at least in my newbe days used to get the feeling that she, as an old-fashioned smoking car (later helped on by "the last one in the land"), secretly identified with him and when she saw that he was successful she thought there might be hope for her too." Well, this got my brain a-churning on how to fix it. As much as people hate having Belle be cut, I'm the type who would've cut or reduced Dinah's role and used the time dedicated to "Pearl Twirl", "UNCOUPLED", and "GRS" to make a stronger second act where Rusty isn't a pinball protagonist. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PinballProtagonist Meanwhile, in this less-Dinah-heavy story, I would make Ashley my second lady of interest. In my scenario, the theme would be "value of life" vs "sanctity of life", which fits with the Cinderella story. The train society believe that a train only has worth in what they do, rather than who they are. Poppa, on the other hand, maintains that everyone is important to the Starlight Express, and with the StEx's power, even someone like Rusty can win. However, most don't even believe in the Midnight Train. In their minds he's just a figure in an old lullaby. Some believe they are all machines without souls and that there must be no train heaven for them, so much focus is put on the present life, so they have to obsess over personal performance because they don't want to be sent to the scrap yard or left to rust on an abandoned track. With this back drop, you could then have a chorus of youthful coaches with pretty Pearl in their midst. Here, you could still have Dinah the dining car for the joke, but she would just be an ensemble role, not Greaseball's girlfriend. (She wasn't in the original fairy tale, so it's not a massive loss to have her in a minor role.) Meanwhile, you have the two older cars, Belle the sleeper and Ashley the smoker. Belle is run-down, but Ashley has been refurbished a number of times; it's like the train equivalent of plastic surgery. Ashley is desperate to hold onto her youth because the only happy ending for her is to be sent to a museum or heritage line. However, this is the 1980s when the show came out, and smoking cars are increasingly considered less than P.C. because more humans are getting active against the dangers of smoking and second-hand smoke. Sure, there are still humans who smoke, but the non-smokers are getting more vocal with their protests. As such Ashley' is more inclined to have a good public image, even if she can't kick the habit. After Pearl leaves to race with Electra, Rusty comes to ask his old friend for help, but she refuses. There is no way she is going to be seen with the rusted underdog when her future is on the line. Meanwhile, Belle represents the other side of the coin. Sure, she's run-down, but she's good friends with Poppa, and she knows that she's important to the Starlight Express. That gives her an internal sense of dignity that Ashley lacks. So, she is willing to race with Rusty -- but of course, Rusty has the same bias towards her that the others have toward him. Then she states her case, and he changes his tune (literally, haha). Don't you think that those few changes to the first act fits with the actual story better and has a greater impact conveying the overall message than Dinah's subplot of "Waaah! My abusive boyfriend dumped me!"? As much as I like Dinah and her songs, Rusty is the protagonist of the show, and Dinah's story has little impact on him and does not even parallel or reflect the theme of his story. We in the audience cheer Rusty the underdog to succeed but cry to Dinah, "No, don't follow your dream of getting back together with the guy who mistreats you!" The two scenarios have little to tie them together, and devoting so much time to Dinah's problems means there is less time to flesh out Rusty or his relationship with CB or his internal struggles with believing that the Starlight will help him. Best of all, having Ashley and Belle represent the struggle and acceptance with one's own mortality means that there would be two females in the show who have a goal other than "I need a man!" It also ties in with Rusty's subplot of searching for the titular character and his struggle between doubt and forced faith. In addition, by acknowledging in-universe that smoking cars are losing their popularity, and even throwing in the line about Ashley being the "last [unconverted smoker] in the land," she wouldn't be a dated character because in-universe the whole point would be that she is a dated carriage. She would be so integral to the story that putting Duvay in there would've messed up the message.

---------

Again, this was written in 2014, and the bits about Ashley having a goal like “I need a man!” I think was aimed as a criticism against “A Whole Lotta Locomotion” since I think that’s what we were talking about on Belle’s forums around that time.

#starlight express

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deborahdeshoftim5779 · 7 years

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Responses- The Marvel of Trelsi (Part VIII)

By BoltonEvans post here.

Believe me, I’m in the same boat as far as my OTP goes. While there is a bit more of a variety of fanfiction to explore, the majority of it is grossly out of character (self-loathing homophobic asshole Troy, and Ryan with Sharpay’s personality who refers to Troy as “Bolton” are everywhere), and resort to using extreme traumatic scenarios, such as rape, for cheap drama.

I used to be in another fandom where the homosexual ships involved exploitation of rape as a plot device, which is quite frankly disgraceful. As for Troy being “homophobic”... Is that why he decided to make friends with the most flamboyantly gay... Oh, never mind. I truly believe so many fans were watching a different film altogether.

Even worse, I’m the only person still actively writing for my ship, these days, with the very rare exception cropping up and taking me by surprise every couple of months, or so. It’s a very sad state of affairs.

Sad, indeed. They have far more in common: 1)- A love of the Performing Arts and corresponding commitment, 2)- Strong work ethic, 3)- Kindness, generosity and thoughtfulness, 4)- Humour. The honest viewer doesn’t need to ship them to see this. Gabriella by comparison only meets ONE of the above criteria-- being a hard worker, and that only relates to her academic pursuits. When it comes to Troy or Ryan’s hard work, she’s happy to flush that down the toilet when it doesn’t suit her. (She’s also happy to play the two against each other to get emotional revenge, which is obnoxious).

A few more notes/additions, because I’m both obnoxious, and incorrigible:

- My Tryan bias results in my perspective of Troy seeking Sharpay out and agreeing to perform with her and save her “sinking ship” of a talent show only if she also allows the Wildcats to perform, revolving around Ryan persuading him to do so. Troy was hellbent on dropping out of the show and resuming kitchen duty as a show of solidarity with his friends. It was only because of Ryan that he ultimately changed his mind. So, even though Troy absolutely does uphold his commitments (he is a textbook people pleaser, after all), I view that instance as the one exception where Troy had to be talked into keeping a promise. Thankfully, it was by someone who was actually looking out for him, for once.

That’s a good point. Thanks for pointing this out.

- One minor correction: Gabriella transfers to East High after the new year begins. In the American school system, this would be the start of the second semester, or halfway through the school year, and it’s questionable just when, exactly, she and Troy began officially dating after the events of the first film. In all likeliness, she and Troy dated for about half of their junior year, broke up several weeks into summer vacation, got back together (after Troy was willing to throw an opportunity for a scholarship out the window because of Gabriella’s reaction to him prioritizing his future over giving her a summer worthy of remembering), managed to stay together for most of senior year, then broke up, again, when Gabriella unceremoniously and callously dumped Troy over the phone a week before the year was out.

Correction noted, thanks.

“When Troy tries to show her a golf course in HSM II, she tells him “I don’t play golf”, which is harmless enough. But given that she should have known by then that her boyfriend was on the school’s Golf Team, it would have reflected better on their relationship had Gabriella taken an interest in his golfing, whether she liked it or not. Particularly since Gabriella was later bitter that Troy didn’t ask HER opinion on the much-derided “Italian golf shoes”. If she doesn’t play golf, why does she care?"

This is a brilliant point, even though I believe that Gabriella telling Troy that she doesn’t play golf when he was obviously setting up a date (since he’s the sole half of the relationship tasked with planning every single date they go on), was rude. I’m assuming that Gabriella, contrary to what sense and logic would dictate, doesn’t take any real interest in Troy’s golfing because it was nothing more than a plot point for the sake of the narrative in the second movie, and never comes up, again, afterward. Her general apathy toward him is also a factor, though, of course.

I also want to add that, as far as their lack of a “common thread” goes;

-Gabriella seems unable to commiserate with Troy’s financial woes, and, indeed, never expresses a single concern about how she’s going to afford her own college tuition- another disparity.

Oh, this is a VERY good point. Thanks for noting this one. Contrary to what popular romances like to claim, financial disparities can often harm a relationship, with the lesser fortunate partner feeling inadequate (particularly if they are a man) and yet steadfastly refusing any financial assistance. In Troy’s case, he never envies Gabriella’s financial position or asks for anything from her (although she bums freebies off him ALL the time), and expects to resolve all his financial issues himself through hard work and personal responsibility. This is one of the things I really like about him. However, his flaw of worrying so much also comes to light, which is where, as you say, Gabriella comforting him at the very least would have helped somewhat. Of course, what she ACTUALLY says is that they should “focus on right now”-- in other words, herself.

Whenever Gabriella pulls attention away from his relatable issues and back to her own First World Problems, I tend to think this would have the psychological effect of making Troy feel as though he were complaining too much, if that makes sense? Because he always invests SO much in alleviating Gabriella’s worries whilst sidelining his own. So he would be internalizing a LOT of anxiety, which is extremely unhealthy. In conjunction with the fact that Gabriella makes him feel and look like a toddler in their relationship, his financial woes would make him feel even more inadequate for her as a partner. When his truck breaks down whilst he takes her home, he looks embarrassed, even though the reason is perfectly normal: he needs a new fuel pump. But it’s almost as though he anticipates her mockery, which makes me think that she regularly mocks him when things go wrong-- even if those things went wrong due to circumstances beyond his control. And let’s not forget the fact that he feels so obliged to impress Gabriella by spending his own limited resources on her, even though she can clearly afford to not only provide for herself, but also do nice things for him. What was stopping Gabriella from buying herself a pizza and inviting Troy round for once? Why couldn’t she pay for dinner and a movie sometimes? Why couldn’t she use her mother’s car or help buy her own, since she clearly has the money? Why, as you have already said, could she not help Troy out with his truck woes? (As I’ve said, I’m almost POSITIVE that she would have gotten irritated with him on the ride back from California, because his truck is unreliable. She has no concern for anything that troubles him. I bet she didn’t help pay for petrol, either). He eventually spends/borrows money to attend Berkeley for reasons beyond my humble comprehension.

It’s very unhealthy and Gabriella’s lack of sympathy makes it even worse.

-Gabriella’s bedroom decor, behavior, and wardrobe choices suggest a childlike innocence to her personality, and she talks about wanting things to be "like Kindergarten”, but, as you mentioned, she pokes fun at Troy for holding onto boyhood playthings. Watch her face when Troy takes Robo-Rob from her, worrying that she’ll break the toy robot.

That doesn’t strike me as the face of a girl who finds her boyfriend’s dorkiness and sentimentality for an aspect of his childhood endearing. That’s the face you pull when a person says or does something crazy and you’re trying to wrap your head around it.

You seem to have all the right gifs! Christ. There’s rarely ever any genuine affection in her eyes when she’s around Troy, as I will discuss later. Maybe in HSM I with the rooftop scene, we saw some genuine affection as she was opening up to Troy. That vanished not long later after the webcam stunt, in which her expression was NOT hurt/disappointed, but cold and almost hostile. (Maybe she didn’t want to appear weak or hurt by his words, given that she DID shed tears earlier). And yes, the hypocrisy is staggering in the way she treats Troy’s childhood interests.

-Troy knows his future is coming at him full steam ahead, and even though he has no idea what he wants to do, after high school, and is “being pulled in a hundred different directions”, he acknowledges, “We’re going to graduate. That’s going to happen. Nothing is going to slow down”… while Gabriella laments, right in front of him, life not grinding to a standstill, just for her, so she never has to leave East High. This suggests not just a disparity in priorities, but in maturity levels, as well; something that would have caused an eventual rift between a real life couple that nothing could have patched up.

Absolutely.

Imagine, years down the road- if they managed to stay together- Troy fretting over steadily accumulating bills and taxes while Gabriella rolls her eyes and tells him to just push for a promotion at work. Then, imagine Gabriella finding out that the electric bill hasn’t been paid and their electricity is about to be shut off. Do you think she’d take a stressed out Troy aside and promise to find a way to get them out of this rut, or angrily confront him and demand to know why the bill hasn’t been paid and if he wants them out on the street?

Shaking with laughter! :D Please God, let it not get this far!

Imagine how Gabriella would respond if Troy sustained an injury, in college, that ruined his shot at a career in professional basketball, or if he got laid off from his job. Do you really think she’d stay by his side and try to work things out? Or, do you think Troy would come home to find the engagement ring he put his entire salary toward, sitting on the kitchen table beside a note from Gabriella explaining that she “can’t do this, anymore”?

That dialogue... :D That is JUST what Gabriella would say. I’m laughing because of the sheer irony. We are told that this couple represent “Relationship Goals”... I just can’t! *wipes eyes*

Based on everything I’ve seen in canon, I heavily lean toward the latter.

The Wail Fest in HSM II epitomises Gabriella’s philosophy in a nutshell: “I gotta do what’s best for ME.” She really knows how to play the scorned lover in every one of her Wail Fests. What’s even more insulting in this song is when she sings, “You’ll be okay!” This is AFTER she: 1)- quit the job he secured on her behalf, 2)- mocked and derided him for his promotions, 3)- flirted with Ryan to manipulate his emotions, 4)- dumped him, 5)- and eventually rejected his necklace. She has some audacity! Every time she is about to drop kick him, she constantly makes the presumption that he will understand her behaviour: (HSM I)- “You’ve got your team, and I’ve got mine. It’s WHERE WE BELONG.”, (HSM II)- “I just don’t belong here, I HOPE YOU UNDERSTAND”, (HSM III)- “I can’t be a little adult right now, Troy. I’m hoping you’ll understand that.” It makes me sputter with rage. Meanwhile, when it comes to HER turn to show some understanding in the following situations: (HSM I)- When Troy is clearly being pressured to avoid the Musicals, (HSM II)- When Troy is under pressure from Sharpay’s harassment and his fast rise to fame, (HSM III)- When Troy is worried about his future--- hey, what do you know? Her “understanding” vanishes. It’s like she never heard of the word.

*angry sigh*

I’ll discuss more of this in later posts. If you don’t mind, I’ll add some things you’ve said here. (Giving credit, obviously).

Thanks for the responses!

#Trelsi #BoltonEvans #Responses #TheseAreGreat #Playmakers #LiterallyTroyAndKelsiForever

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nancylou444 · 7 years

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This was submitted to me:

I’m copying and pasting it here, to make it ‘anon’, and to protect those involved.

Why I hate Misha Collins

Nancy,

I often read your blog because you accept all opinions, even those you don’t agree with. It’s one of the only places I feel that is true. I’m sharing the following story with you because I think it’s important. It’s my truth and it infuriates me how excusatory Misha’s fans are. I can’t be exusatory about him, not anymore. I think you’ll see why after you read this. You don’t have to share it, but I felt like you would…like to know? I guess? Know that you are not imagining things, that your instincts about the man are spot on. If you do share it, I hope you’ll do so behind a read more. I’m sure that the haters (as I mention) will have a quick and visceral reaction. Thankfully my friend, whose story I’m sharing, will never know. I just needed to get it all off my chest.

There are many out there who hate Misha Collins because of Destiel or his obnoxious fans or even simply because he does and says problematic things.

There are many out there who love Misha Collins, because it’s popular to do so right now, because they feel like he “cares” about them personally, because they think that he’s “one of them”…a misfit, an outcast, a weirdo. (All incredibly ironic, considering he doesn’t actually seem to be any of those things; a large segment of the entertainment and media industry routinely portray him as a handsome, articulate, humorous man. For hits? Probably. But they certainly aren’t portraying him as a weird social outcast, now, are they?)

I would wager almost none of these people who profess he’s a “literal angel” actually know Misha Collins. Follow him on twitter? Sure. Paid money to meet him or get a photo at a con where he has additionally been paid a large sum of money to be exactly who you want him to be? Maybe. That thirty-five seconds doesn’t give you enough information to make an informed or accurate depiction of the real man, however. And neither does any random blog of a “hater”.

I hate Misha Collins for none of the reasons stated above. I hate Misha Collins because I have witnessed his treatment of someone I love, and it was dismissive, disdainful, terrible. We will call her Jane.

Jane worked for Random Acts for a long time, and in that time accomplished some pretty amazing things. Probably some things we’re at least familiar with or maybe even used. Those of you who are going to call me just a “hater”, do the research. The Random Acts staff has almost entirely changed in the past year. Friends, that’s not normal. If it was a great place to work, people would stay. Let’s just say it’s not a coincidence the entire staff is different than it was a year ago. We’re not talking about one or two disgruntled employees; we’re talking about more than a dozen. More than a dozen(!) people left their position in very recent months, but not all of them left without trying to fix things, or trying to make it better.

Jane was one of those people. Jane spoke to Misha about what it was like, what his infamous “kindness organization” was really perpetuating behind the scenes. Misha didn’t care; and not only did he not care, he refused to recognize the enormity of losing someone like Jane. (Ok that’s my personal bias, but…) Someone with absolutely no motive –Jane had already quit—was trying to help, offering a rare glimpse from someone who had already devoted hundreds of hours of her personal time to accomplish his mission. Someone literally doing his work for him. No recognition for her efforts or years of service would be forthcoming, nor any acknowledgement of the many positive changes and examples of her work ethic and dedication. Believe me, I waited. I waited for him to acknowledge…something. He never did, and I find that ridiculous and unforgiveable.

Needless to say, Jane was devastated when he blew her off. She was disillusioned by a man she had formerly admired, but also by the people she left behind who were apparently so afraid of losing his favor they chose to remain silent rather than step in as member after member left or was forced out of the organization. (I told her she set the bar for character far too high for these people…she called me a cynic. This is our relationship, in a nutshell).

Did Misha dismiss Jane’s story simply because it was easier than listening? Did he receive a sordid tale behind her back from the source of the problems? Likely. But what of the dozens who also left under eerily similar circumstances, both before and after? At what point does he stop and look around and say: Wait. This doesn’t add up. I’m smarter than this. (He is, right?) And more importantly: Why would a person (or multiple people) who had dedicated that much time and energy to build the organization up, do anything to tear it apart? It would be self-defeating, ridiculous, nonsensical.

Jane and Misha spoke one last time, or rather Jane spoke and Misha chose not to respond. She is a beautiful, kind, giving individual, who has lived some of those dire circumstances Random Acts’ talks about in their blog posts and tumblr updates. Some of those dire circumstances Misha himself claims as his own personal history. (Irony.)

Jane still serves others, so at least she hasn’t let this experience sour her completely. It has definitely made her more cautious though, and that evolution has been hard to watch. Jane’s own story is one that would break your heart. She knows depression, anxiety, poverty, and death. She knows the bleak side of life’s cruelty and has faced her own demons. Exasperated, hurt, and confused by Misha’s careless treatment of her, she eventually made the decision to share her personal history with him, one last attempt to reconcile the truth, because no one had afforded her that opportunity before.

He ignored her.

In that random, brutal way life has, Jane would suffer a devastating tragedy shortly after that, one I doubt she ever recovers from, and even though she had been a longtime and faithful employee of this kindness organization, she and her family were patently ignored by them during that extremely difficult time. I don’t know how you can reconcile that, except to conclude these are the actions of petty, vindictive, childish people, people who would sooner be ignorant than cognizant of their own behavior, and would sooner act self-congratulatory than put forth a hand of love and giving. If I were ever face to face with any one of them I would ask: How can you look at yourself in the mirror and continue to pretend? How does every kind thing you promote not haunt you? How do you not recognize your own spiteful segregation and discrimination? How can you ever call yourself kind or good?

I hate Misha Collins, not for any printed reason, or any show related cause, not for any fan activity or problematic tweet. I hate Misha Collins because he is the worst kind of person, the kind who wears two faces, and the private one is the ugliest of all.

Misha treated Jane this way because there was no risk involved. He knows no one “important” would ever believe Jane, not over him, he has too many fans and his voice is too large. He rests comfortably in the knowledge that even if someone like me, small, unknown, and anonymous, shares her story it will be dismissed. The haters will come forward en masse to defend him, to defend Random Acts, and to tear both me and Jane apart. Even though the evidence is there if you look for it.

I hate Misha Collins because he hides behind a veil of benevolence, and doesn’ t have the balls to admit when he is wrong, when he has wronged. He won’t take responsibilities for his (or his organization’s) actions, even when they have done their damnedest to cause harm.

To cause harm.

Think about that. They willfully caused harm to an individual who had never been anything other than an asset to them, and Misha abetted that. Complacency is no defense. He had something good and wonderful, someone who deserved better, someone who has suffered the worst life can hand her, and he chose to give her another lesson in duplicity and faithlessness instead.

So, I hate Misha Collins for Jane. And for all the Jane’s that we will never know.

—————————————————————

For ‘anon’ and Jane:

Take care. xoxoxo

#extremely #anti misha #antimisha his charity #praise chuck and simone

36 notes · View notes

thehrisworld · 7 years

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Facts Are Important and Why They Are Not Enough

New Post | Facts Are Important and Why They Are Not Enough

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One of the on-going issues in project management as well as executive sponsorship that I keep coming across are the presentation of facts.

Facts are good and should not be ignored – unfortunately most people stop there.

Facts are only snapshots – they rarely take into account the context before, during and after the fact was established.

Which makes waving facts fruitless and frustrating in front of those that know better (like yours truly).

Most facts will change when the environment around them changes — meaning facts are contextual.

Once you understand the need to question the context before, during, and after a fact, someone can waive all the facts they want in front of you without effect — and they’ll believe you’re the one that’s nuts until they learn this principle themselves.

You — all of us — are all ignorant about something and usually about many things, and in every instance throughout any given day you have the option to either make yourself available to learn, or not.

One can have all the knowledge they want, but without discernment and wisdom as well as making themselves unavailable to learn, they will remain more stupider than any ignorant.

Another point — believing your source is trustworthy does not equate to facts being trustworthy.

Perceptions, skewed data, beliefs, past experiences all play a part in what anyone believes is true — that, however, hardly makes a fact true.

There is a whole ‘nother level to talk about when it comes to facts and that will be discussed at a future time, and more likely in a paid webinar.

Principles are applicable in all areas of life, not just where one selects they should be — and principles have been around since before man could write.

Being politically correct isn’t really helping the situation much either as such words like to ‘soften’ the impact of words — which only softens everything else as well, like facts.

If you want hard and true facts you can’t be using soft wording — it’s like trying to sharpen a knife… on a sponge…

A study of any civilization, culture, faith, religion, sovereignty, political party, business organization, any large group of people will expose certain principles that just cannot be ignored no matter who they are, when they lived, where they believe they are going, or who they believe they are (or were).

Principles are as unbiased as unbiased gets — and you don’t need AI to be sure of this.

Principles Are the Brothers to Ethics

Principles are like ethics — there is no such thing as government ethics though many will try, there is not such thing as business ethics though many expound there is, there is no such thing as personal, sports, name-your-flavor ethics…

There is just ethics and principles work will function as they are in spite of beliefs, facts, opinions…

You do not even have to believe in the principle and it will still make its presence known – good, bad, or indifferent.

When you learn or hear of something that is challenging your beliefs and your knowledge and yet remain unchanged, refusing to face your convictions (aka emotions) then that only makes you stupid, no matter how many degrees and awards you have.

If that seemed harsh, ask yourself why — we are all taken back by words that convict us, and at that point we have two options: either run towards our convictions or run away from them.

We can never change ourselves running from our convictions — only when running to them.

We are ignorant about something we have not learned yet, once having learned that something we are no longer ignorant…

Making Yourself Available to Learn

What differentiates ignorance from stupidity is your willingness to make yourself available to learn… period.

That willingness is determined multiple times every day with every incident you experience – as well as with attending a formalized lesson at any level.

Any of us can have all the knowledge in the world from whatever sources, yet without discernment, without wisdom, any of us would will remain stupider than any ignorant by not pursuing wisdom, discernment.

An Example

Recently, I came across this post written by Justin Campbell, who is the General Manager of LibertyWorks Inc.

Though Justin is focusing on the political arena, the post presents a great case-in-point for context, facts, principles, ethics, wisdom, and discernment.

Not sure if that was Justin’s intent but that is what he delivered.

If political content bothers you, here’s something to remember: we can learn more from our enemies than we do from our friends WHEN we make ourselves available to learn.

No one ever sharpened a knife on a sponge — no one ever sharpened their wits by surrounding themselves with like-minded either.

We all can learn from people we don’t like, even hate — our prejudices is what closes the door, which in turn makes us unavailable to learn

Our willingness to be open, to make ourselves available to learn is the only thing that keeps doors, opportunities coming.

Now that post I came across…

2016 Word of the Year: Post-Truth… Really??

“In November the Oxford English Dictionary named “post-truth” its word of year.

“Post-truth is defined as, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.”

“The term post-truth along with the phrase ‘low information voter’ have gained popularity post Brexit and Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. Presidential election.

“This has led many in the Twitterati to quote John Maynard Keynes stating, “when the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, Sir?”

“Out of this has come the assumption that there are 2 types of people, those who believe in ‘facts’ and those who are led by the their emotions (low-information voters).

“However, few have asked, What are facts? How reliable are they? Or even, should facts be the primary basis of political decision making?

“The simplest definition of a fact is: ‘A thing that is known or proved to be true’.

“So the first thing one should ask is whether someone’s fact is in fact a fact.

“Too often opinion or evidence is passed off as fact.

“Having evidence of something does not necessarily make it true.

“It’s no surprise that many fact checker websites often get accused of bias, since, if they confined themselves to provable facts they would have little to write about.

“In March 2016 the ABC Fact checker assessed the claim opposition leader Bill Shorten made that the evidence from Europe shows the minimum wage doesn’t contribute to unemployment levels.

“What the ABC Fact checker wrote was an persuasive essay assessing the arguments on both sides of the minimum wage debate.

“The minimum wage debate is one of the most controversial issues in economics and is not capable of being fact checked.

“The truth is that there are many studies arguing both sides and the issues are too complicated to ever be known.

“The minimum wage debate shows the important difference between evidence and facts.

“There is much evidence that increasing the minimum wage does result in a decrease in demand for labour; however, there is also significant evidence showing no or minimal effect.

“Most complicated public policy issues are like this: incapable of ever being determined solely by fact.

“Decision makers instead must assess the strength of evidence and develop an argument based on that evidence with a framework of values.

“This problem of imperfect evidence becomes worse when one considers the problem of reproducibility in many disciplines.

“The gold standard of evidence in science is the controlled experiment, however, in economics, psychology and climate science controlled experiments are rarely possible.

“Too often studies are not reproducible; one study found that only half of all economics papers are reproducible.

“Similar studies have found a similar lack of reproducibility in other disciplines.

“This crisis in academia should at very least make one more sceptical of supposed facts generated by such studies.

“Austrian-school economists have long be critical of the ability of mathematics and econometric models to predict human behaviour.

“Ludwig Von Mises wrote in his book Human Action, “The experience with which the sciences of human action have to deal is always an experience of complex phenomena — no laboratory experiments can be performed with regard to human action.”

“The same principle can be applied to other sciences where controlled experiments are not possible.

“While evidence from studies are interesting and can inform argument, it cannot be considered fact.

“Even when one is in possession of verifiable facts, those facts cannot determine priorities.

“Which is more important – creating jobs or saving an endangered species?

“What do you value more – traditional culture or modern living standards?

“All these decisions are determined not by facts, but individual priorities.

“In free societies these decisions are determined democratically and that is inherently political.

“Such decisions are not the purview of science, but of politics.

“When one claims their view is scientific, they are making a flawed argument.

“If facts can’t be the sole basis for developing an opinion what should be used in its place?

“I would argue that philosophy should be used as a framework for assessing arguments.

“In my case, I assess the evidence available in context of a philosophy that holds liberty as the most important value.

“I ask does this increase or decrease liberty for the individual?

“What are the consequences for the individual?

“Where two person’s liberties clash, I then assess solutions based on which option best preserves liberty for both parties while resolving the conflict.

“In practise facts are less common than often claimed by those claiming we live in a post-fact world.

“People should always assess available evidence to inform their decision, but often that evidence is imperfect.

“Even with facts people still need to assess information on the basis of what they prioritise.

“My highest priority is liberty.”

A reminder: we are only focused on one thing here — discerning facts from emotions, evidence, experience, fallacy…

Principles, ethics, character are the cornerstones of leadership — politics or not.

Side note: If you are dropping any of the 3 just because it is politics, where does that leave you? Serious question.

You – all of who are leaders — should be doing what we can to raise the bar of leadership and stop making someone else’s problems yours.

Content, Context, Perspective

Facts are important – but they are only part of the situation,

Facts in content only, absent of context, are perceptions based only upon limited knowledge and / or limited experience, and many times are empty sacks full of feelings and / or emotions..

In such a case, even a string of facts on the same topic is only as a string of content and perceptions on the same topic.

Too many times, many will make a judgment based upon how they feel about something — all while pretending not to know that emotions, feelings are the most fickle of human traits.

That being the case, how wise is using feelings for facts? judgment? assessment? decisions that will affect, lead others?

How many do you know have done just that (and start with your mirror)?

Yet many do this every day – in work, in life, in reporting, in story telling, in friendships, in leadership…

Context determines how that fact came about and is many ways more important than the fact itself.

You can tell your aunt, your mother, your sister, your wife or significant other that she has a face that can stop a clock or you can tell her she has a face that makes time stand still — both are facts, but without any context to the situation.

And like truthful context, only one is going to get you anywhere.

You can discover more about clear content and skewed perspective here.

And as with any of our posts, your comments are more than welcome in the comment section below. Where do you see leadership failing our employees? Where should our focus really be on? Do we need to relearn the pillars of leadership as a whole?

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